Britvic outperforms market

At its annual meeting today (28 January), the company – whose brands include Robinsons, J2O, Fruit Shoot and Tango – said GB sales of its still drinks were up 7% by volume against a market decline of over 6% in the 12 weeks to 21 December. Fizzy drinks volumes were up by 2.8% against a market volume decline of 1.9% in the period. International business delivered exceptional growth, Britvic said, with a volume increase of over 8% driven largely by Christmas activity in the Netherlands with Fruit Shoot. The soft drinks market in Ireland continued to suffer from what Britvic said were “extremely poor and unique macro-economic conditions that began in the spring of 2008, and have deteriorated in the last quarter of 2008”. As it had announced last week, Britvic said it had begun consultation with staff which could lead to a reduction of up to 145 jobs within Britvic Ireland. GB & International would see only minor team restructuring. Chairman Gerald Corbett told shareholders: “We are taking strong management action on costs and forecast a further 1% reduction in raw material inflation to 4.0-4.5% in 2009, completing the underpinning of the exceptionally challenging trading conditions in Ireland. “We have seen very strong GB & International trading in the first four weeks of the second quarter. Combined with our robust first-quarter performance, decisive action in addressing costs, consistent execution of our resilient point-of-purchase, marketing & innovation strategies and more favourable commodity costs, this leads us to be confident about the delivery of the Board's expectations for the full year.”