Britvic’s Irish sales dip 11.2%

The performance of the soft drinks market in Ireland was again described as “challenging” by Britvic in its report for the 28 weeks to 15th April which stated that the market here shows no sign of recovery in the near term.

Off-trade soft drinks values fell 2.0 per cent in H1 while sales in pubs and clubs declined by 5.0 per cent compared with the same six-month period the previous year – and that includes the VAT increase to 23 per cent.

Britvic Licensed Wholesale’s Irish revenue declined 11.2 per cent to £72.7 million from €81.9 million in the six months to 17th April 2011 and Britvic has undertaken a further review of the business in implementing a multi-year programme of cost-cutting initiatives which will run into at least late 2013.

Pre-tax profits at UK parent company Britvic fell 10.5 per cent from £27.7 million to £24.8 million on revenues up 1.3 per cent to £641 million at constant exchange rates.

In the UK poor weather hampered sales in H1.