Côte Restaurant Group has filed its accounts for the year ended September 2022, with turnover of £144.9m.
That is more than double the £72.7m reported in FY21, a year which was heavily impacted by Covid lockdowns.
The group also announced it has appointed Laura Wood as CFO, who was previously at Wagamama as strategy director and interim CFO.
During the accounting period, Côte trading was significantly impacted by the pandemic, the Ukraine war, inflation, and a cost of living crisis affecting the consumer landscape.
Like-for-like turnover was flat vs 2019, reflecting the Omicron impact on Christmas trading and the impact of cost inflation being borne by guests.
Adjusted EBITDA was £3.6m (2021: £0.3m). Côte has an undrawn £10m credit facility.
The Partners Group-backed French brasserie brand has embarked on major investment to contemporise the brand and enhance the core estate.
Key hires to support this include executive chef Steve Allen (formerly of Gordon Ramsay group), and Simon Townsend (formally CEO of Ei Group plc) who has joined as non-executive director.
The restaurant group said “good progress” has been made stabilising and organising the business with quality restaurant leadership, with “sustained improvements” achieved in guest satisfaction, operational controls, and labour turnover.
Côte completed 12 refurbishments in the period, along with a development kitchen facility. Further refurbishments will be completed in 2023.
It entered into a brand partnership with Magic Breakfast charity, which provides healthy meals to disadvantaged children, cemented by management and Partners Group donations of £250,000.
Côte said it is progressing sustainability goals throughout the business, including ingredients provenance and credentials, waste and energy management, with distribution redesign reducing mileage by 750,000 miles per annum.
New energy contract signed for FY24 will save £8m annually compared to current rate.
Executive chair Jane Holbrook said: “2021/22 was a challenging year with a macro environment impacted by both Covid and the knock-on effects of the Ukraine war. We’ve built our foundations for growth and are very well supported by Partners Group, acting on behalf of its clients. We are excited about our recent progress and have embarked on a brand renaissance supported by a brilliant team.
“We’d like to thank our outgoing CFO James Sherrington who leaves us with our very best wishes after two years to pursue a long-planned lifestyle change for him and his family.
“We welcome Laura Wood as our new CFO. Laura comes to us after working at Wagamama as Strategy Director and Interim CFO.
“We also welcome Sarah Hills, formally executive operations director at the Ivy Collection and managing director at Megan’s and Wagamama, who has joined us as COO.”
