Greene King's annual profits rise on back of retail growth

27th Jun 2013 07:04

Pub operator Greene King reported a 6.6 per cent year-on-year rise in pre-tax annual profit to 162m pounds, driven by a hike in sales in its retail division. Total revenues were up 4.8% to £1.19bn for the year to April 28th as retail like-for-like sales grew 2.3%. Its Brewing & Brands business core own-brewed volume was up 1.0% and revenue jumped 2.1%.Operating profit jumped 5.1% to £248.2m while adjusted basic earnings per share advanced 7.5% to 57p.Chief Executive Officer, Rooney Anand, said the company proved resilient in the face of a "long, cold and wet winter"."This has been another successful year with record results and further, significant progress, led by our retail business, which has delivered 12% profit growth," Anand said.While the company has made a strong start to the year, Anand said the overall outlook remained subdued as "we are not assuming a pick-up in the economy".However, the company is focusing its business towards higher growth areas of our markets and constantly improve its customer offer to mitigate the effects of the economy.Greene King recommended a dividend of 26.6p per share, up 7.3% on the previous year. RD