Good weather adds fizz to Britvic Ireland Q4 revenues

The recent good weather boosted Britvic Ireland’s fourth quarter revenues by 1.8% year-on-year to £40.5m (€48m).

However, for the full financial year — to the end of September — turnover fell by 3.5%, to just under £137m.

Ireland has been the soft drinks group’s most challenging market for some time and in the preceding third quarter, the country was the only region where the group saw any revenue decline.

The group’s latest trading update, published yesterday, noted that the underlying trading conditions in Ireland “remained largely unchanged from last year”, with revenue growth in the fourth quarter “reflecting the benefit of the good weather”. Average realised price was down — in Ireland — by 2.9% in the final quarter, reflecting ongoing consumer focus on value.

Britvic upped its Irish presence in 2006, via the €249m takeover of the former soft drinks division of C&C, giving it such brands as Club, MiWadi and Ballygowan.

On a group-wide basis, Britvic grew fourth quarter revenue by 12.8% year-on-year to £366.4m and full year revenue by 4.4% to £1.32bn.

There was steady growth in its core UK division, while revenue in its French arm and international distribution unit were up by 6.2% and 28% for the full year.

Britvic added that market share for its popular Fruit Shoot product — which was temporarily recalled from the UK and European markets last year due to packaging faults — is back to pre-recall levels in Britain and ahead of those levels in major markets like France and Holland.

The company’s detailed full-year earnings will be published towards the end of next month.