Wetherspoon predicting gains from smoking ban

Published on Friday 7 September 2007 12:06

THE smoking ban will be to the long-term benefit of the licensed trade, according to leading pub group JD Wetherspoon.

The chain has 40 pubs in Scotland, including five in and around Edinburgh, such as Foot of the Walk and Standing Order.

The company said that when the ban was introduced in Scotland it put considerable pressure on sales and margins, before trade staged an "encouraging recovery".

It said its outlook remains "cautious" for 2008 because of the uncertainty in the market south of the Border following the recent introduction of the ban there.

The comments came as the chain, which currently has a planning application in for the South Bridge site of former clothes store Flip, unveiled pre-tax profits for the year to July 29 up six per cent to 62 million.

A smoking ban came into force in England on July 1 and the company saw like-for-like sales rise by only 1.1 per cent in August, compared to 5.3 per cent in the month immediately following the ban.

JD Wetherspoon chairman Tim Martin said: "We have no doubt that this legislation will be to the long-term benefit of the licensed trade."

John Hutson, the firm's chief executive officer, said: "The amount of people that smoke is falling every year. Those who do are increasingly affecting those who don't.

"Unless smoking was banned, that would have made pubs more unpopular, so our view is that the ban can be positive and make pubs more popular places."