Shepherd Neame toasts 'positive' year, ups dividend

Shepherd Neame reported a jump in full-year earnings on Wednesday, aided by a strong recovery in London and improving economic conditions.

Britain’s oldest brewer, which also operates 291 tenanted, leased and managed pubs in London and the south east, said it had been a "positive and encouraging" period, with a "refreshing degree" of stability.

Revenues rose nearly 4% in the 53 weeks to 29 June, to a record £172.3m, while underlying profits sparked 4.4% at £7.9m.

Total retail like-for-like sales improved by 4.9%. In the regions, sales edged up 1.1% but jumped 14.5% inside the M25.

Total beer volume was down 11.8%, but profits rose as the company refocused on higher margin on-trade sales.

Richard Oldfield, chair, said: "After the major challenges of recent years, the last 12 months have brought a refreshing degree of stability and a strong performance for the company, though we will continue to face cost and legislative headwinds that are common to the sector."

He added that the firm had seen a faster-than-expected "strong bounce back in London".

"In time, we hope that this level of activity will spill out into our region. There is good reason to believe that, with net disposable income growing and interest rates starting to fall, consumer confidence will improve over the next couple of years," he said.

In the nine weeks to 31 August, tenanted like-for-like pub income was up 3.1%. Underlying retail sales rose 3.8% in the 13 weeks to 28 September, while total beer volumes fell 11.5%.

Jonathan Neame, chief executive, said: "We have a strong pipeline of pub developments and new opportunities in our heartland on-trade.

"We are optimistic about the consumer outlook and well positioned for the future, notwithstanding ongoing cost headwinds."

The Kent-based firm, which was founded in 1698, is recommending a final dividend of 16.5p per share. That takes the total dividend for the year up to 20.7p, a 3.5% improvement year-on-year.