Wed 11th Feb 2015 - Starbucks reveals full details of UK performance Starbucks reveals full details of UK performance: Starbucks UK, led by Mark Fox, has filed accounts that show the full detail of its performance in the year to 28 September 2014. Turnover rose by 2.3% to £408,721,070 from £399,405,183 the year before. Its pre-tax profit of £1,056,196 was a turnaround from a loss of £20,465,123 the year before. It did, however, pay royalties and licence fees of £26,871,574 in the year following on from £25,917,670 the year before. The number of company-operated sites dropped by a net 43 in the period to 506 sites. Its operating margin moved into positive territory of 0.2% compared to minus 5.2% the year before, “which represents the most significant year-on-year growth of profit before tax experienced by the company since 2010”. Like-for-like sales rose 5.9%. The company also benefited from a 3% reduction in the cost of goods, driven by “continued focus on reducing costs and improvements in coffee prices” and lower expenditure and administrative costs due to opening more franchise stores and an associated fall in staff costs of 2.2% to £107.2m. The number of licensed stores and franchised sites increased, respectively, by 15 to 157 and by 40 to 80. The company stated: “We have been encouraged by the performance of these stores and we expect more to open in the 2015 financial year.” The number of Starbucks employees dropped to 7,345 compared to 7,726 the year before. Starbucks reported that during the financial year it offered 771 Level 2 apprenticeships and 183 Level 3 apprenticeships in line with its commitment to hire 1000 apprentices across Starbucks UK by December 2014 - a total of 21 employees undertaking Level 3 have been promoted to store managers. It added: “We will continue to commit to apprenticeships in 2015 and aspire to employ 600 apprentices at any one time.” Starbucks reported it has met its commitment to pay £20m in tax “despite a lack of taxable income” by paying a final payment of £5.2m in 2014 after paying tax of £14,835,000 in 2013 and 2014 financial years. The company’s highest paid director earned £286,713 compared to £272,405 the year before.