Revolution Bars Group is back in the black after restrictions lifted
The group behind Revolución de Cuba and Revolution chain of bars is back in the black as trading returned to normal.
Manchester-headquartered Revolution Bars Group has seen its growth hampered over the past two years due to restrictions around Covid-19.
Most recently, prior to the impact of the Covid variant Omicron, both Revolution and Revolución de Cuba were in growth, with Revolution in particular driving strong performance with customers returning to their bars.
However, the group said the Government’s “fear campaign” regarding Omicron and ‘Plan B’ had “derailed festive trading” as corporate customers cancelled or postponed large group bookings.
The company said confidence has now returned since the removal of restrictions in late January and it is now seeing customers return in full numbers again.
Reporting its financials for the 26 weeks ending 1 January 2022, Revolution revealed revenues had grown to £74.1m. That’s up from £21.6m for the same period in the previous year.
The group’s pre-tax profit grew to £4.3m, up from a loss of £17.7 in 2020 when the group experienced months of restrictions.
Net bank debt reduced from £21m to £4.2m in the 26-week period.
Revolution also added that it will be closely monitoring rising inflationary cost in areas such as employment, food, transportation and energy and will take action to mitigate where possible.
CEO Rob Pitcher said: “We are hugely encouraged by the performance in FY22 H1 and are excited about the future as we all now “learn to live” with COVID-19.
“We are emerging strongly following a period of severe disruption and now believe that, assuming no further variants, we can look forward to a sustained period of growth.
“We continue to urge the Government to support the recovery and rebuilding of the hospitality industry by leaving VAT at 12.5% for food and non-alcoholic beverages and retaining business rates relief at current levels, in-particular maintaining the cap at £2m, not reducing it to £110,000.
“Demonstrating our renewed confidence, we have signed our first new lease since 2018, have a pipeline of opportunities, and several amazing refurbishments taking place. There’s never been a more exciting time for the Group.”
