UK soft-drinks maker Britvic reported a fall in first quarter revenue as the coronavirus pandemic hit its out-of-home sales, with a rise in home consumption failing to make up the shortfall.
The company, whose brands include Tango, J2O, Fruit Shoot and Teisseire, on Thursday said total revenue fell 9.8% to £328.1m.
In Great Britain, revenue fell 4.1%, with strong at-home growth of 11.9% offset by a decline of 32.5% in out-of-home, resulting in adverse pack and channel mix, Britvic added in a trading statement.
Brazil revenue continued to grow strongly at 25.6%, whereas comparable rest of world revenue fell 19.3%.
“The introduction in GB and Ireland of tighter pre-Christmas COVID-19 restrictions, and the subsequent national lockdown measures, have put further pressure on sales in both the hospitality sector and on the go consumption,” the company said.
“While there remains considerable uncertainty over the depth and duration of future restrictions, we anticipate they will remain in place at least through our second quarter.”
“Consequently, we would expect performance to continue to be significantly affected by similar adverse channel and pack mix to that which we saw in the second half of full-year 2020, and gradually improve following the lifting of restrictions,” it added.
