Mitchells & Butlers, the leading operator of managed restaurants and pubs has announced its full year  results.  Its brands include Harvester, Toby Carvery, All Bar One, Miller & Carter, Premium Country Pubs, Sizzling Pubs, Stonehouse, Vintage Inns, Browns, Castle, Nicholson’s, O’Neill’s and Ember Inns.

The company has reported that like-for-like sales grew by 3.5%, with strong performances across all brands contributing to continued, consistent outperformance of the market. Within this, the uninvested estate grew by 1.5% demonstrating breadth of performance across the portfolio. Total sales grew by 3.9% over the year.

Adjusted operating profit of £317m grew by £14m against last year. Ignite initiatives focusing on sales and efficiency enhancements have resulted in adjusted operating margin growth of 0.1ppts, despite the inflationary cost headwinds which continue to impact our sector. On a statutory basis, profit before tax of £177m grew by 36.2% against last year.

• Strong adjusted profit before taxa growth, up 10.7%
• Like-for-like sales growth of 3.5%
• Adjusted operating profit growth of £14m to £317m (FY 2018 £303m)
• Adjusted earnings per share growth of 9.1% to 37.2p (FY 2018 34.1p)

  Phil Urban, Chief Executive, commented: “These strong results reflect the work we have done over the last few years, first to build sustained sales growth and then to convert that into profit growth. It has been extremely encouraging to see an improvement in like-for-like sales growth across the portfolio during the year, fuelled by our Ignite programme of work. This puts us in a stronger position as we move forward into the next financial year, in what we expect to remain challenging market conditions.”