Afternoon:
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JD Wetherspoon, the pubs chain known for cheap beer and no music, is nimbly skirting the crisis in the industry.
With six pubs in Britain closing each day and rivals struggling to cope with rising alcohol tax and a vicious consumer downturn, 'Spoons just trundles along.
Today it said that sales in the past 11 weeks slipped 0.8%. But over the year, like-for-likes are up 1.2%, steady growth that has got the City asking whether the company should pick up the pace of expansion.
It has 714 pubs. Oriel Securities says in a note: "Its format is capable of considerable expansion through new openings with scope to double the number of pubs." Finance director Keith Down notes today that it is cheaper than usual to open a new outlet, because the company is able to snap up failing rivals and convert the properties rather than start from scratch.
Wetherspoon manages its own pubs rather than leasing them to private landlords.
