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UK pub operator Fuller, Smith & Turner cuts 20% of staff as pub chain swings to loss

Dried out plants are seen in a window box outside the Butchers Hook & Cleaver pub, owned by Fuller?s, in London, Britain, July 3, 2020.   REUTERS/Simon Newman
The Butchers Hook & Cleaver pub, owned by Fuller's, in London. Photo: REUTERS/Simon Newman

Fuller, Smith & Turner (FSTA.L) has shed one in five jobs over the past year, as the UK pub and hotel group battled coronavirus restrictions on trade.

The company announced on Thursday it had swung to a loss of £22.2m ($29.6m) on an adjusted basis in its financial year to 26 September. It had made profits of £17.9m a year earlier.

Revenues slumped from £167.1m last year to £45.6m as a string of restrictions from shutdowns to curfews to the rule-of-six hammered trade.

Simon Emeny, chief executive, said sales in 37 of its largest central London sites had slumped to less than 30% of the previous year’s levels after London became a “ghost town” under tighter regional restrictions in October.

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He said the company’s workforce was 20% lower than at the start of the financial year, as it “streamlined” its teams and saw 300 staff transferred as it sold its pizza and cider arm The Stable. “We have reassigned as many team members as we have made redundant.”

Emeny said in a statement alongside the company’s results: “It feels like Groundhog Day.”

“At the time of drafting this review of the last six months, all 388 of our pubs and hotels are closed, 98% of our people are on furlough or flexi-furlough, and we are a week away from hopefully reopening the estate,” he wrote.

The company was one of more than 50 pub and brewing companies which wrote to prime minister Boris Johnson this week warning "huge portions" of the industry risked going out of business.

They claimed restrictions - with English pubs facing stricter rules than under the previous regional lockdown system - were "exceptionally harsh and unjustified."

Fuller, Smith & Turner shares were up on Thursday 26 November despite posting a loss. Chart: Yahoo Finance UK.
Fuller, Smith & Turner shares were up on Thursday 26 November despite posting a loss. Chart: Yahoo Finance UK.

But the chief executive is confident about the future. “The tightening of the tier system will present further challenges over the winter months, but we welcome the Prime Minister's comments that we will see the need for restrictions fall away in the spring. Without doubt, a return to normality is in sight.”

The past year has also seen the company sell off its entire beer, cider and soft drink brewing business to Asahi for £250m.

The results appeared better than expected despite losses, with shares in Fuller, Smith & Turner up 4.5% on the announcement.

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