Wetherspoon plans to open 25 pubs after positive start to the year

JD Wetherspoon PLC on Wednesday said it targets opening up to 25 new pubs in the current financial year after reporting higher sales in the first quarter.

The pub chain said like-for-like sales grew 8.2% in the first 14 weeks of its financial year to November 1, with total sales up 9.1%. By segment, bar sales rose 9.4%, food by 6.8%, and slot and fruit machine sales by 7.1%, while hotel room sales fell 1.4%.

The company said it outperformed the NIQ RSM hospitality business tracker, which records monthly like-for-like sales for several pub and restaurant companies, for 49 months in a row: in September, Wetherspoon sales rose 9.9% while the tracker rose by 2.7%.

Net debt at the end of the first quarter fell to £736.0 million from £756.0 million a year earlier.

In the new financial year, Wetherspoon opened six managed pubs located in Manchester and Heathrow airports, Crewe in Cheshire, Ferndown in Dorset, Dibden Purlieu in Hampshire, and Kempston in Bedfordshire. The group also opened two franchised pubs, bringing its estate to 797 managed pubs and 25 franchises.

The company expects to open five to 10 more managed pubs and 10 to 15 franchised ones during the year.

Chair Tim Martin said: "The company has had a good start to the financial year. There are still three quarters to go and profit forecasts are very dependent on the level of sales growth."

Wetherspoon said it is comfortable with current market expectations, adjusted for its 53-week financial year, which forecasts pretax profit of £76.4 million for financial 2027.

Martin added that government policies on labour costs have affected the hospitality industry unevenly compared with supermarkets. He said the labour cost of a pint is estimated at £1.68 in pubs, but about 15 pence in a supermarket.

"This economic effect has widened the price gap between a pub pint and a supermarket pint in recent decades, which has been a major factor in pubs losing half their beer sales to supermarkets since the millennium. However, it has also resulted in a substantial decrease in employment," he said.

"The net effect has been to push up the cost of a pint or a meal in a pub relative to supermarkets- and to reduce the number of jobs in the economy."

JD Wetherspoon shares rose 0.3% to 94.66 pence on Wednesday morning in London.

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