Thu 18th Apr 2024 - Celebrations and early Easter holiday lift hospitality groups to 5.2% growth in March Celebrations and early Easter holiday lift hospitality groups to 5.2% growth in March: Britain’s top hospitality groups achieved above-inflation like-for-like sales growth of 5.2% in March, the latest CGA RSM Hospitality Business Tracker reveals. Many operators will have enjoyed the boost to trading events such as Mother’s Day and St Patrick’s Day brought. But the high growth metrics seen in the tracker have been aided by early Easter bank holiday revenue falling into March, while last year, Easter trading fell into April. The tracker, produced by CGA by NIQ in partnership with RSM UK, shows particularly strong growth for the managed pub sector, where like-for-like sales were up by 7.2% in March. Growth was softer for restaurants at 3.4%, and the on-the-go segment has seen a 5.2% decline. While bars recorded a decline of 0.5% in March, this is somewhat of an improvement from the 13.6% and 7.4% declines in January and February respectively. For the first month since November, restaurant, pub and bar groups achieved higher growth outside London than within the capital. March sales inside the M25 were 4.0% up on last year but ahead by 5.7% beyond it. Karl Chessell, director at CGA by NIQ, said: “These figures are encouraging for hospitality after a slow start to 2024 and show that people remain eager to celebrate holidays and special occasions in restaurants, pubs and bars. While spending remains tight for many consumers, we can be cautiously optimistic that their confidence will continue to increase in 2024 in line with an easing of inflation. Operators still face severe headwinds, and it may be some time before they generate sustained real-terms growth, but March showed the sector is moving in the right direction.” CGA by NIQ collected sales figures directly from 105 leading managed groups for March’s edition of the CGA RSM Hospitality Business Tracker.