(Alliance News) - Restaurant owner Tasty PLC on Tuesday reported continued disappointing sales as the UK casual dining market struggles.
Shares were 11% lower in morning trading in London at a price of 3.39 pence each.
Tasty, which owns 57 restaurants made up of 51 Wildwood and 6 dim t sites, mainly operates outside of London.
Revenue for the 26 weeks to June 30 fell 8.3% on the year before to GBP21.1 million, though the pretax loss has narrowed considerably to GBP861,000 from GBP11.6 million.
The sales decline came despite benefiting from weak comparables after 2018's hot summer and the football World Cup. Tasty said good cost control helped profitability, however, as did a steep fall in impairments and depreciation.
"The casual dining market continues to face headwinds and the uncertainty of Brexit means 2019 remains a challenging year. The group's sales performance has been weak despite benefiting from weaker comparatives following last year's extreme weather conditions and the World Cup," said Tasty.
"However, despite sales being down, our adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation performance for the first six months is in-line with expectations due to tighter cost control. Over the last 18 months we have made significant changes to the structure of the group including finance and operational team enhancement."
"The changes to the operational structure combined with the group's increased focus on the financial reporting and cost management, has mitigated the impact of the difficult market conditions," the company added.
Tasty said performance is usually second-half weighted, and trading since June has been "encouraging". December, as usual, will be the most important period of the year.
By George Collard; georgecollard@alliancenews.com
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Tasty (TAST)