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Months Ended 31 March 2002; Believes Opportunities Exist to Buy More Hotel Assets This Year |
Six Continents PLC announces today, Thursday 23 May 2002, its interim
results.
(for the 28 weeks ended 13 April 2002 for Six Continents Retail and Britvic Soft Drinks and six months ended 31 March 2002 for Six Continents Hotels) 1. SUMMARY
Operating profit
Earnings per share were 31.9p compared to 22.7p** in 2001 Adjusted earnings per share before major exceptional items were 18.7p compared to 26.4p** in 2001 Interim dividend per share up 2.9 per cent to 10.7p
Hotels - management actions limit impact of the events of 11 September 2001: accelerating investment to take full advantage of the upturn
Revenue investment in marketing, sales force and reservation systems to drive growth Posthouse rebranded to Holiday Inn - renovation of 2,000 rooms this year Strong distribution pipeline - 490 hotels with 66,800 rooms Retail - strong performance, with successful brand conversion strategy Total sales ahead 7.8 per cent: market share gains Average sales per outlet up 6 per cent to £14,200 per week: over
three times industry average
347 former Allied sites converted to date - total of 400 by year end Post-conversion sales uplifts continue to exceed 40 per cent 122 branded outlets opened in the first half - total of over 250 this year Strong pipeline of outlets - 600 sites identified for conversion Soft Drinks - record first half Continues to perform strongly in competitive market Building on strength of existing brands and successful new product development Strong growth in Pepsi, Robinsons, Fruit Shoot and J20: total volume
up 3.5 per cent
In Retail, we expect continued strong overall sales growth driven by the high uplifts from our conversion programme and the improving supply/demand balance in the industry. The benefits of brand scale and the efficiencies that we are achieving will help us to mitigate some further regulatory cost pressure on margins in the near term. 3. COMMENTS
�The results for the first six months of the financial year demonstrate the strength of our business during exceptionally tough conditions in the global hotels market. Their impact has been limited by the actions we have taken to stimulate demand in Hotels and improve efficiency together with strong performances in Retail and Soft Drinks. �Our corporate strategy remains focused on seeking the right investments in a fragmented hotel market, to make the best use of our balance sheet resources. Given the sensitivity of private and public valuations to the pace of recovery, we continue to believe that there will be opportunities to execute our strategy and create value over and above our substantial organic expansion plans. However, we do believe that valuations will have largely recovered by December. Therefore, if we have not found such opportunities, then, no later than the end of this calendar year, we will commence a return of surplus funds to shareholders through a share repurchase programme. �We are confident in the future of our business given the continued investment in our brands, our people and our properties.� Tim Clarke, Chief Executive, commented: Overview
�In Retail, the combination of our growing scale advantages and the capacity of our brands to add value to a strong site pipeline will sustain high investment returns and strong earnings growth.� Hotels
�Going forward, our priorities are to maximise the profits recovery of the owned hotels, to expand brand distribution scale and to enhance our RevPAR delivery to the franchised system. �We see improvements in RevPAR being driven by recovering US travel and better long term economic prospects, more favourable supply trends and as a result of our significant revenue investment. �Six of the Big 10 Inter-Continental hotel renovations are now complete
and 2,000 rooms from the
�As a result we are confident that Six Continents Hotels will take full advantage of the upturn in the market.� Retail
�Spending on eating and drinking out continues to grow at 2.5 per cent per annum in real terms, whilst industry capital expenditure is falling. Overall like-for-like sales performance is recovering accordingly. �Much of our new brand development has been in the pubs segment, with the rapid roll-out of Ember Inns, Arena and the Sizzling Pub Co. With higher levels of amenity, service and value, they are capturing substantial share in the largest segment of the market. We have a further 400 sites in this segment capable of profitable conversion. �The success of our strategy to develop high-take, high-return outlets continues to give us important scale benefits, in purchasing, overheads and at the outlet level. �We opened 122 branded outlets during the half year and will open over 250 this year. We continue to make excellent progress with the rebranding of the former Allied estate achieving well over 40 per cent sales uplifts. We will have converted a total of 400 outlets by the end of the year with a further 600 outlets identified from our pipeline to convert to our existing brands and operating formats. �With the industry trends moving in our favour and the actions we are taking, Six Continents Retail has strong prospects for earnings growth and high investment returns.� Six Continents is a leading global hospitality group with over 3,270 hotels across nearly 100 countries and territories and over 2,060 restaurants, pubs and bars in the UK and Germany. Six Continents Hotels is the world�s leading global hotel group whose brands include Inter-Continental Hotels and Resorts, Crowne Plaza Hotels and Resorts, Holiday Inn, Express by Holiday Inn and Staybridge Suites. It owns, manages, leases or franchises more than 3,270 hotels and around 512,000 guest rooms in nearly 100 countries and territories around the world. Six Continents Retail is the UK�s leading managed restaurant, pub and bar group with over 2,060 outlets including brands such as Vintage Inns, Harvester, Toby, Browns, All Bar One, Scream, O�Neill�s, Edward�s, Ember Inns, Arena and Goose. Britvic Soft Drinks is one of the leading UK producers and distributors of branded soft drinks with brands such as Tango, Robinsons, Britvic and the UK franchise for Pepsi. |
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Mark Rigby 020 7409 8105 Six Continents PLC [email protected] |