Yahoo Finance Wimpy Restaurants’ Covid-19 recovery stalls as customers cut spending
The UK arm of fast food chain Wimpy Restaurants has seen its sales dip slightly after a strong couple of years of recovery from the Covid-19 lockdowns.
Wimpy, which is owned by South African-headquartered Famous Brands, saw its revenue drop to £6.9m in the year ended February 29, 2024, down from £7m in the 12 months before, according to its full year results published on Companies House.
The burger chain’s reduced sales delivered a hit to its pre-tax profit, which fell to £799,000 from £918,000 in the year before.
The dip came after a strong period of growth for the chain, which saw it increase its pre-tax profit to £665,000 in the 12 months ended February 29, 2022, from a pre-tax loss of £1.35m in the year before.
The parent company said that political and economic uncertainties in Europe had resulted in lower consumer spending.
At its height, Wimpy Restaurants had around 380 branches in the UK, but numbers have fallen over the decades to around 63 sites today.
Famous Brands, which also owns fast food chain Steers, reported an eight per cent increase in group revenue to R8bn (£347m) in the year ended February 29, 2024.
However its operating profit dropped by seven per cent to R812m (£35m), due in part to the Gourmet Burger Kitchen (GBK) liquidation dividend of R75m received in the previous financial year.
The UK arm of GBK was purchased from Famous Brands in 2020 in a rescue deal by Boparan Restaurant Group, which also snapped Carluccio’s out of insolvency earlier in the pandemic.
The company said it slid into administration after the virus impacted upon its liquidity and potential to be sold as a solvent business.
A year later Famous Brands opened the first Steers burger joint in Clapham Junction. The chain currently has around 505 sites in South Africa and 43 more across the rest of the continent.
