All Bar One and Toby Carvery owner announces 1,300 job cuts due to pandemic

All Bar One and Toby Carvery owner, Mitchells & Butlers, has announced 1,300 jobs losses after the company reports an annual loss of £123 million.

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Earlier this month, the company announced that it was closing up to 20 of its pubs and restaurants, and began redundancy consultations with staff.

Profits plunge

Although the group had already confirmed that restaurants and pubs closures would be made, it did not then disclose how many roles were at risk - with redundancies of 1,300 staff members now announced. The group has not yet said where the redundancies will be or how many job losses will hit each of its brands.

The group has seen heavy annual losses for the year to 26 September, in contrast to pre-tax profits of £177 million the previous year.

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The hospitality sector as a whole has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic and the measures put in place to control its spread - including the first lockdown back in March.

Full-year revenues dropped 34 per cent to £1.5 billion, and the company said total sales since the end of September have decreased by 50.8 per cent.

Mitchells and Butchers said, “Despite our best efforts to protect as many jobs as we can, we have had to make circa 1,300 redundancies following the end of the financial period.

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“The reduced levels of activity and closure of a small number of our sites meant that we could no longer support these roles.”

‘The future will remain both challenging and highly uncertain’

The group, which also owns the Harvester brand, said the outlook was dependent on the Government’s restrictions to contain coronavirus, but noted that its suburban brands of Miller & Carter and Premium Country Pubs have fared well.

However, the company’s city centre pubs, such as Nicholson’s, have been hit the hardest.

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“The future will remain both challenging and highly uncertain with the duration and depth of the trading restrictions imposed on the hospitality sector in response to the Covid-19 pandemic being, in the first instance, the primary determinant of our financial performance,” the group said.

Phil Urban, chief executive of Mitchells, however said, “We remain optimistic that we will be able to regain the momentum previously built and continue to achieve sustained market outperformance when the current operating restrictions are eased.”

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