Greggs says to beat year profit expectations

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LONDON, Dec (Shanghai: 600875.SS - news) 15 (Reuters) - British food-on-the-go retailer Greggs (Other OTC: GGGSF - news) has upgraded its profit outlook for the second time in four months, saying it is benefiting from a favourable trading environment and generally helpful weather.

The firm said on Monday it now expected profit for the 53 weeks to Jan. 3 2015 to be ahead of analysts' expectations.

Prior to the update analysts were on average forecasting a pretax profit of 53.6 million pounds ($84.4 million), according to Reuters data, up from 41.3 million pounds in the previous year.

Greggs, which trades from almost 1,700 retail outlets, said sales at stores open over a year rose 5.2 percent in the 24 weeks to Dec. 13, taking growth so far this year to 4.2 percent.

Year-to-date total sales are up 3.6 percent.

"Trading conditions have remained helpful but there is no doubt that customers are also responding to improvements in our product and service offer and to the investment we are making in the shop environment," said Chief Executive Roger Whiteside.

Shares (Berlin: DI6.BE - news) in Greggs, up 52 percent so far this year, closed Friday at 656.5 pence, valuing the business at 665 million pounds. ($1 = 0.6354 pounds) (Reporting by James Davey, Editing by Paul Sandle)