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3rd February 2025

Admiral Taverns: Financial Results for the 52 weeks ended 26 May 2024

INVESTMENT IN UK COMMUNITY PUBS CONTINUES TO UNDERPIN PROFITABLE GROUP GROWTH AND SUSTAINED STRATEGIC PROGRESS

PUBS TRADING THROUGH TO JANUARY 2025 AHEAD OF OUR EXPECTATIONS AND THE GROUP REMAINS WELL POSITIONED FOR FUTURE PROFITABLE GROWTH

Admiral Taverns, the UK’s leading community pub group and owned by real estate private equity firm Proprium Capital Partners, is pleased to announce the Group’s financial and operational results for the 52 weeks ended 26 May 2024.

BUSINESS HIGHLIGHTS

Continued growth underpinned by further progress against Group strategy to acquire, develop and maintain a high-quality estate of successful, individual, wet-led community pubs at the heart of their communities

  • Strong trading across the estate of over 1,400 pubs, with performance ahead of expectations:
    • Underlying earnings before depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of £59.7 million for the period (2023 – £55.9 million).
    • Current pro forma EBITDA of £65 million. o Outperformance against budgets underpinned by high level of returning investment and proactive measures implemented to help licensees navigate a challenging macroeconomic environment.
  • Significant investment of £36.8 million across Group’s pub estate over the period (2023 – £27.7 million) supporting growth in profit per pub.
  • Proceeds of £24.7 million from the sale of sites reinvested in the estate (2023: £27.1 million).
  • Group successfully delevered from 7.5x EBITDA post Hawthorn acquisition in August 2021, to 5.5x EBITDA in June 2024.
  • Continued focus on strategic expansion with the support of investors, Proprium Capital Partners, with post year-end acquisitions including:
    • Acquisition of 37 sites from Fuller, Smith & Turner plc on 25th June 2024 o Acquisition of 18 sites from Marston’s plc on 26th September 2024
  • Pubs trading through to January 2025 ahead of Management’s expectations, demonstrating the Group’s resilience, and remain well positioned to continue to deliver sustainable profitable growth.

Highly proactive, licensee-centric business model that supports publicans to maximise their retail opportunity and embrace their local community.  Continuing evidence that people value community pubs as social hubs and support local entrepreneurs who operate them

  • Admiral ranked first amongst the national pub companies in the overall rating of the independent 2024 Licensee Trade Index. Includes a first or second place in 71% of the assessed criteria, indicating that the people who matter most to our business are happy with our service.
  • Lobbied on behalf of licensees for further support from the Government, to introduce lower alcohol duty on draught beer and reform of the Business Rates system, supporting UK community pubs.
  • Voluntarily capped increases to beer prices and rental income to assist licensees in creating sustainable, profitable pub businesses that support communities.

Acceleration of growth in Admiral’s Community Wet Led Operator Division, Proper Pubs

  • 34 sites converted during the period, taking this division to more than 200 pubs.
  • Significant capital investment has positioned Proper Pubs well in the value market and generated excellent returns.
  • Proper Pubs operators continue to embrace their role as community champions, raising funds to install defibrillators on the outside of their pubs and supporting a range of local and national charities, with over £1 million raised for charity.
  • Crowned ‘Best Community Pub Company 2024’ in the highly competitive Publican Awards in March 2024.

Further progress against ESG strategy

  • Group completed roll-out of energy saving equipment in pub cellars and behind bars as part of a £3.0 million investment to date. This investment was made at no cost to licensees.
  • Further focus on replacing energy inefficient lighting and heating across Admiral’s pubs, installing additional insulation and upgrading EPC Ratings to improve sustainability and reduce costs for licensees.
  • Hedging strategy for Group’s own energy requirements for Operator Managed estate through to 2026, comprising forward purchases of gas and electricity directly from the wholesale market, bypassing utility retailers.
  • Achieved ‘zero to landfill’ for waste from Operator Managed Pubs and converted vehicle fleet to electric.
  • Continue to work with the British Beer and Pub Association and others to make improvements to the non-domestic energy market via OFGEM.

Current trading demonstrating resilience 

  • Pubs trading through to January 2025 ahead of Management’s expectations, underpinned by buoyant drink sales and gaming machine income and further conversions of sites to Proper Pubs.
  • Well-positioned to weather the impact of Budget changes to NIC and Business Rates.
  • Continued focus on the delivery of internal improvements in the business to provide licensees with valuable support, investing in pub estate and supporting pubs to enhance their retail offers.
  • Ongoing Government lobbying to increase awareness of social value of UK community pubs.
  • Continuing to explore opportunities to add further sites to our community focused, wet led pub estate.

KEY FINANCIALS

Group financials for the 52-week period ended 26 May 2024

  • Group Turnover of £194.5 million (PY: £182.0 million)
  • Gross Profit of £111.8 million (PY: £104.4 million)
  • Underlying Operating profit of £37.2 million (PY: £36.9 million)
  • Underlying EBITDA of £59.7 million (PY: £55.9 million), and current pro forma EBITDA of £65 million
  • Pub EBITDA per pub increased by 14% vs PY

Chris Jowsey, CEO of Admiral Taverns commented: 

“I’m particularly proud of the strong progress we have made against our strategic plans, delivering profitable growth across our estate as we continue to expand our footprint and cement our position as a champion of UK community pubs.

Indeed, in these evolving macro conditions, the resilience of our model has come to bear, and we anticipate a further structural shift towards leased and tenanted pubs. The investments made across our estate with over £36 million reinvested over the year in supporting our licensees to develop and improve their wet led pub offering, have clearly been fundamental to helping drive trading performance.  However, it is perhaps the breadth of our wider support offering, from investment in energy saving initiatives to enhancements of our pub’s retail offering, that have been critical in helping our entrepreneurial licensees optimise profitable trade growth.

Over the course of the year, we were particularly delighted to receive recognition from our industry for the success of our approach. In March our operator managed division, Proper Pubs, was named as ‘Best Community Pub Company 2024’ in the prestigious Publican Awards and more recently we were once again ranked first amongst the national pub companies in the annual independent licensee sentiment tracker for the UK’s leased and tenanted pub sector, improving our scores year on year.

As we look to the future, we remain focused on driving further improvements to enhance our support offering and will continue to look for opportunities to expand our community pub estate.  Post year end, with the continued support of our investors, Proprium Capital Partners, we were delighted to announce the acquisitions of pub portfolios from both Fuller, Smith & Turner and Marston’s and we look forward to working together with our new licensees to grow these pubs as profitable small businesses and social hubs for their communities.

Current trading is ahead of our expectations, demonstrating the strength and resilience of our business and estate, and the Group remains well positioned to  continue to deliver profitable Group growth and sustained strategic progress.

I’d like to end by extending a huge thank you to our entire team, including our publicans for their continued hard work and dedication and look forward to working together to deliver further progress in 2025.”

-ENDS-

Enquiries

Admiral@houston.co.uk

0204 529 0549

Notes To Editors: 

Admiral Taverns (“Admiral”) is the UK’s number one community pub group. Headquartered in Chester; the Group operates a national estate of over 1,400 predominantly wet-led community pubs. Admiral’s unique operational approach has earned industry recognition with the Group winning Best Community Pub Operator at the 2024 Publican Awards, whilst also being shortlisted for Best Partnership Pub Company (501+ Sites). In 2019, 2016 and 2013, Admiral Taverns won Best Leased and Tenanted Pub Company at the Publican Awards and ranked highly commended as Best Community Pub Operator in 2017. The Group has also been consistently highly rated by licensees in the industry’s independent annual Tenant Track survey, exceeding the scores of all its national peers.

About Proprium Capital Partners

A spin out of the Morgan Stanley Real Estate Special Situations team, the Proprium principals have been investing in real estate operating companies since 1996, focusing on scalable themes with experienced local partners and platforms. Proprium’s strategy of platform investing seeks to deliver private equity returns in the real estate industry. Today, Proprium has grown to over USD$4 billion of net assets under management primarily within living, hospitality, and logistics strategies with a global platform of six offices across the US, Europe, and Asia Pacific. Further information can be found at www.proprium.com


Enquiries

Admiral@houston.co.uk

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