The Jurys Doyle Hotel Group this morning reported a 7% increase in pre-tax profits to €45.3m, on turnover of €284.5m, and said it was broadly positive for 2005.
Basic earnings per share amounted to 59.7 cent, and adjusted for goodwill amortisation and profit on hotel disposals, diluted earnings per share grew by 5% to 63.1 cent.
The hotel group reported an improved business environment in the London and Washington hotel markets, where it operates six hotels. A solid performance from the Jurys Inn division was also reported, with the Jurys Inn group in the UK reporting a 37% growth in trading profit.
Trading profits in the group's US operations was up 40% in dollar terms and included a first time contribution from its new Jurys Boston Hotel.
During 2004, Jurys Doyle opened four new Jurys Inns in Leeds, Chelsea, Heathrow and Dublin as well as the Jurys Boston Hotel. Plans for the opening of two new Jurys Inns in Southampton and Nottingham are also progressing, while a new four star Jurys Hotel at Croke Park is due to open early in September.
The hotel group today announced plans for the development of a further three new Jurys Inns in the UK - in Milton Keynes, Brighton and Liverpool. This will result in almost 1,800 new bedrooms coming on stream.
Jurys said the Dublin hotel market continued to be very competitive in 2004, with a 7% reduction in trading profit, mainly as a result of the increased supply of new hotels in the Greater Dublin area and competition from other European cities for discretionary conference and leisure business.
Room occupancies improved by just under 1% to 72%, but these gains were offset by a corresponding reduction in average room rate resulting in no growth in the key profit driver of revenue per available room (revpar) in 2004. However, in the second half of the year an overall increase in total revenues was reported with some improvement in the group's cost base.
The Group now operates six 3 star Jurys Inns in Ireland with the newest Jurys Inn in Dublin's Parnell Street opened since last August. Combined, the six Jurys Inn reported a 5% increase in trading profit for 2004.
The three Jurys Inns in Galway, Cork and Limerick delivered good growth in revpar, while the group's Inns at Christchurch and Custom House in Dublin reported a small decrease in revpar due to a small fall in occupancy rates.
Jurys Doyle's UK hotel group consists of three hotels in London and one in Cardiff, Bristol and Glasgow. Overall, these saw growth of 10% in trading profit, which the group described as 'satisfactory' with the recovery in the London market especially encouraging.
The group operates 11 Jurys Inns in the UK. This segment of the business saw growth of 37% in trading profit with the group saying the performance of the newly opened Inns in Newcastle, Glasgow, Leeds and Chelsea was encouraging.
The US hotel operations produced a 'very satisfactory performance' in 2004 due to strong profit recovery from its three Washington based hotels in addition to first time trading profit contribution from the new Jurys Boston Inn. Jurys Doyle said the 40% reported growth in US trading profit last year was excellent, although it said the reported growth was scaled back to 27% when converted to euro due to the continued appreciation of the euro against the dollar.
The hotel group said that during 2005 it will finalise and begin executing its strategic plans for its hotels in Dublin with particular emphasis on operating structures, site efficiency and financial returns. It said it was currently undertaking a review of Jurys Ballsbridge and the Berkeley Court hotels, following a similar review of its Burlington Hotel which could result in up to 100 redundancies.
'The business outlook for 2005 is broadly positive. Overall, we are aiming to deliver further underlying improvements in turnover and profit during the year ended December 2005,' the company's results statement said.
Shares in Jurys Doyle had slumped 42 cent to €12.15 in Dublin this afternoon.
