Fri 14th Oct 2016 - Papa John’s makes record UK profit as turnover hits £50m Papa John’s makes record UK profit as turnover hits £50m: Papa John’s, the US pizza business with 319 franchised stores in the UK, has reported turnover in the UK rose 19.6% to hit £50,530,000 in the year to 27 December 2015, up from £42,246,000 the year before. A total of 37 extra stores were open in the year compared with 282 sites open at the end of 2014. Pre-tax profit was £3,897,000 compared with £2,273,000 the year before. The company stated: “Prior year’s turnover increased by 20% in 2014. Turnover has increased through a combination of store growth and increased like-for-like sales from continuing operations in the franchised Pizza John’s network. For the tenth consecutive year underlying comparable sales of our UK outlets grew. The pizza market does, however, remain intensely competitive with significant promotional discounting taking place in 2015 as previous years. Given that the company has had periods of sustained profits and continues to forecast profits, the company has recognised a deferred tax asset of £1,207,000.” The company reported Friday and Saturday nights contribute 45% of total sales for the week. 2015 was the first year Papa John’s undertook national TV advertising in the UK, which led to “an increase in the number of enquiries from potential franchisees considering joining the brand”. Papa John’s reported that it is now the third largest pizza delivery business in the UK. Of total turnover, £1,058,000 derives from operations in Ireland. The company still had total trading losses from its UK operation of £6m as of December 2015 to carry forward. Papa John’s takes head leases on sites for between ten and 25 years and sub-lets to franchisees for ten years, with an option to renew for a further five years. In June this year, Papa John’s opened its new UK and European headquarters in Milton Keynes. The company relocated all its head office functions to the site in Northfield Drive following a £2.1m refurbishment of its Pizza Quality Control Centre and dough factory. The project took eight months to complete and houses more than 100 employees. Papa John’s business development manager Anthony Round said at the time: “The creation of a central UK and European base marks a significant investment into the continued future expansion of Papa John’s into the UK and Europe. Our Milton Keynes location is also home to Papa John’s fresh pizza dough factory, our state-of-the-art facility that supplies well over 300 franchised units across the UK on a daily basis. With all head office staff and functions now on one site, we can gain logistical efficiencies in addition to providing the best training and meeting facilities for our visiting franchisees too.” Profit in the UK has grown steadily since 2012 when Papa John’s made a modest pre-tax profit of £102,000 on turnover of £28,415,000 as it moved to a store network of 212 sites.