Barworks and Dean’s Diner report record profit: London-based bar and restaurant company Barworks and Dean’s Diner operator Good Life Group, two companies with the same four directors, have reported a combined pre-tax profit of circa £2.65m on combined turnover of circa £14.9m, placing the directors’ two companies among the UK’s most profitable smaller operators. Barworks, the operator of six London bars and restaurants, sold its Hoxton Bar and Kitchen site for £1,875,000, the company’s annual accounts reveal. The company produced turnover of £8,448,599 in the year to 30 June 2013, although Hoxton Bar and Kitchen was sold 15 weeks short of the year-end – turnover was £7,955,669 the year before. Pre-tax profit was £1,810,078 compared to £434,404 the year before. Interim dividends amount to £683,400. The company reported two more sites have been acquired since the year-end and profit for the current year is expected to be “maintained at close to the record level of the year under review”. It added: “In addition, income from management services supplied to associated undertakings and third parties is forecast to rise steadily. Meanwhile, each active venue within the Barworks Group is delivering profits once the initial period of bedding is passed so that the overall business is going from strength to strength.” The Good Life Group, which operators seven Dean’s Diners, has reported turnover of £6,450,207 in the year to 30 June 2013, up from £5,581,737 the year before. Pre-tax profit was £711,327, up from £459,869 the year before. During the year, in May 2013, a seventh diner, in Gloucester Road, London, was opened. A leasehold site in Queens Road was sold in June for £270,000. Interim dividends of £582,660 were paid by the company. An eighth diner, at Spitalfields Market, London was bought after the year-end and another site is under consideration. The company added: “The business is well-placed to make further core investments in the immediate and longer term future – partly funded by cash generated within the business and partly by bank finance. These expansion plans could undoubtedly be accelerated if appropriate sources of long-term finance were to be obtained and the directors are actively exploring all such avenues.”

Vimac assets underwent pre-pack sales last month to Kymel: The key trading assets of Vimac, the restaurant and nightclub company formerly headed by Paul Mackings, were sold in a pre-packaged administration last month, Begbies Traynor has reported. The Crab and lobster, Thirsk and Trenches, Whitby were sold for £4.5m to Kymel. Two other closed freehold sites, Loft, Kendal and Onyx, Middlesborough, are on the market and are expected to raise circa £750,000. Allied Irish Bank is owed around £15m – and around £9.5m of the bank’s debt will ranked as “a creditor with a floating charge”. Bank and cash balances of £403,527 have been passed to Kymel by administrator Begbies Traynor on the basis that all unsecured creditors, including HMRC, would be paid in full. A Begbies Traynor report states: “In addition, all vouchers and future bookings will be honoured. The estimated value of these creditors was in excess of the cash and bank balances transferred and, consequently, the shortfall would be picked up by Kymel. The position was accepted by the bank, who were independently advised. In essence, this was a restructuring of the group hat required the involvement of an administrator. However, as all creditors are to be paid in full they have no interest in proceedings.”