Soft drinks company Britvic has reported higher profits and revenues for the six months to the end of March and said it was confident of continued sustainable growth.
Britvic, whose brands include Ballygowan, MiWadi, Club, Cidona, TK, Robinsons and Fruit Shoot, said its half year revenues rose by 11.2% to £880.3m, while its profit after tax increased by 10.1% to £59.9m from £54.4m.
The company said its adjusted earnings per share rose by 18.5% to 27 pence, while it declared an interim dividend of 9.5 pence, up 15.9% on the same time last year.
It noted that it saw "standout" growth from its Pepsi MAX, Ballygowan, MiWadi, Fruit Shoot and Lipton brands.
Britvic said its performance in Ireland remained "robust", with half year revenues up 8%.
It noted that the Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) for PET bottles and cans, known Re-turn, started in Ireland in February.
"As expected, the launch has had a small impact on volumes, though it is still too early to evaluate the full impact and in other markets this has normalised over time," the company said.
It added that return rates for the scheme are ahead of where they were for launches in similar-sized European countries.
Britvic said it was pleased with its brand performance in Ireland, noting that in particular Pepsi grew volume and revenue, benefiting from the brand refresh. Ballygowan and MiWadi also delivered a strong first half performance.
The company also said it has completed a supply chain programme to release additional production capacity in its Irish factories, by introducing new work rosters, while also implementing cost-efficiency savings within the manufacturing and warehouse operations.
Britvic said that during the second half of the year it will prepare its PET lines in Ireland for "tethered caps", an EU legislation that will be enacted in July and it will also expand the production capacity for the fast-growing Ballygowan Hint of Fruit flavoured drink.
The company said its Great Britain division saw volumes increasing by 2.6% and revenue by 8.8% with revenue growing in both the retail and hospitality sectors.
It noted that Pepsi was a key driver of growth, with revenue increasing 8.5%, on the back of the brand refresh investment in March and growth in cans, enabled by additional capacity to meet growing consumer demand.
Meanwhile, revenue in its Brazil business jumped by 34.7%, with volumes up 22.3%, benefiting from strong growth in the existing brands as well as the acquisition of Extra Power last October.
Simon Litherland, Britvic's chief executive, said the company was today announcing its third share buyback of £75m over the next 12 months, which he said reflected its strong earnings, free cashflow generation and positive outlook.
"As expected, our market-leading growth comes from the combination of another strong performance from our scale family favourite brands, coupled with accelerated growth in Brazil and across multiple new growth spaces, such as London Essence, Aqua Libra and Plenish," the CEO said.
"Looking forward, I am confident that we will deliver a strong full year performance. In the medium term, I firmly believe the continued execution of our strategy and growth drivers will allow us to sustainably outperform both the market and our historical top-line growth rate, leaving the company poised to continue our long-standing track record of delivering outstanding returns for our shareholders," he added.
