UK's Wetherspoon faces staff crunch as losses nearly double (updated)
01/10/2021 07:52
(Adds details, background)
Oct 1 (Reuters) - Pub operator Wetherspoon JDW.L said on
Friday it faced difficulties attracting workers in some areas of
Britain, after posting a near doubling of annual losses due to
pandemic restrictions for most of its fiscal year.
The company, fondly known as "Spoons", reported a pretax
loss of 194.6 million pounds ($261.85 million) for the 12 months
ended July 25 compared to 105.4 million pounds a year earlier,
while like-for-like sales slumped 38.4%.
British pub operators, who are just seeing signs of recovery
after months of closures or reduced capacity, have been
struggling with a staffing crunch partly due to a post-Brexit
exodus of European workers. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N2N81ZK
That shortage could pressure the industry during the usually
busy Christmas season. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2QP104
Although like-for-like sales at Wetherspoon in the first
nine weeks of the current fiscal year were still down 8.7%
compared to pre-pandemic levels, the company said it was
cautiously optimistic about 2021 as all curbs have been lifted.
Wetherspoon refrained from proposing a final dividend for
the year, as it was forced to seek debt waivers from its
lenders, raise money and cut jobs due to the pandemic.
($1 = 0.7432 pounds)
(Reporting by Muvija M in Bengaluru; Editing by Ramakrishnan
M.)
((muvija.m@tr.com; within UK: +44 20 7542 1810, outside UK: +91
80 61822698; Twitter: https://twitter.com/muvija_m;))