New owners pleased with Belhaven's brew

Published on Tuesday 24 January 2006 00:31

BREWER Greene King, which snapped up Dunbar's Belhaven Group last year, gave the Scottish acquisition a solid first report card under its ownership yesterday.

A statement from the brewer, covering the 36 weeks to 8 January 2006, said: "Belhaven Best volume was up 8 per cent and the integration of the Belhaven business has continued to progress well, with delivery against our synergy targets running to plan. The Belhaven and Greene King teams are working well together, and Belhaven's trading results remain in line."

The English group bought East Lothian-based Belhaven for almost 190 million last autumn, ending almost 300 years of Scottish ownership for the country's biggest independent brewer.

Suffolk-based GK, well-known for its Speckled Hen brew, said like-for-like sales at its Pub Company managed pubs were up 1.6 per cent, while its tenanted pubs, under the banner of Pub Partners, saw like-for-like sales rise 2.2 per cent.

GK's overall brewery volumes increased 8 per cent, with sales of Greene King IPA up 5 per cent, its strong Old Speckled Hen up 10 per cent and its flagship Abbot Ale up 6 per cent.

Profit margins remained robust: 43.7 per cent at the tenanted pubs, 20.8 per cent at the managed pub arm, and 22.7 per cent at the brewing company.

Greg Feehely, a drinks analyst at Altium Securities, said the pub figures were slightly weaker than at the interim results in December, but said they were ahead of those of rival Wolverhampton & Dudley last Friday.

Feehely said: "We currently feel that the attractions of Greene King are more than contained within the current rating.

"On that basis we would look to at least take some profits at this level."

GK, which announces its annual trading results for the year to end-April on 11 July, 2006, initially saw its shares fall 1.2 per cent to 730.5p but they later recovered to close down 1.5p at 738p.

That compares with a 52-week high of 775p and a low of 567.5p.