Greggs Regulatory News (GRG)

10 May 2006 12:00

Greggs PLC10 May 2006 10 May 2006 GREGGS plc CHAIRMAN'S AGM STATEMENT Greggs is the UK's leading retailer specialising in sandwiches, savouries andother bakery products, with a particular focus on takeaway food and catering.It has over 1,300 retail outlets throughout the UK, trading under the Greggs andBakers Oven brands. At the Annual General Meeting held in Newcastle upon Tyne today, the ChairmanDerek Netherton said: "The current year has developed very much in line with the expectations we setout in our preliminary statement in March. Like-for-like sales in the 18 weeksto 6 May 2006 were flat, continuing the trend already reported. This compareswith a period of very strong growth last year, when like-for-like sales in thefirst 19 weeks increased by 5.8%. Costs have increased as we expected, with the rise in energy costs making aparticularly strong impact on the first half and, as a result, profits to dateremain materially below the level of last year. For the rest of the year, weexpect to see benefits from the actions we are taking to reduce costs and from anumber of initiatives to drive turnover growth. Overall, although it is still early in the year, we believe that the businesswill perform in line with our previous expectations for the year as a whole,although the first half will be materially affected as described above. We willprovide a further update at the time of our interim results, due to be announcedon 4 August 2006. Since 1 January 2006 we have opened 14 new shops and closed two, making a netaddition of 12 to 1,331. This is in line with our stated target to make a netaddition of approximately 35 shops to our portfolio during the year. So far this year the company has purchased a total of 360,000 of its ordinaryshares for cancellation, at an average price of £38.23 and a cost of £13.8million. This is in addition to the purchase of 439,829 shares at a cost of£16.3 million by the trustees of the Greggs Employee Benefits Trust. We areseeking renewal and extension of our authority to buy back shares at today'sAGM, and expect to continue a buyback programme over the medium term where it isin the interests of shareholders generally. We continue to review the optimumcapital structure of our balance sheet. Susan Johnson will be retiring as a Non-Executive Director on 30 September 2006and I would like to express thanks, on behalf of the Board, for the contributionshe has made during the past six years." ENQUIRIES: Greggs plc Hudson Sandler Sir Michael Darrington, Managing Director Jessica Rouleau / James HillRichard Hutton, Finance Director Tel: 020 7796 4133Tel: 0191 281 7721 keithhann.communications Keith Hann Tel: 07831 521870 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange