SSP Group
It is to SSP’s great benefit that when it floated on the London stock market in the summer of 2014, it was not, relatively speaking, terribly well run. This has allowed continuing improvements to margins from better procurement and greater efficiencies in deploying staff around its 2,000-plus concessions.
Meanwhile, new outlets are being added, mainly on the airport side, there being a limit on how many more buffets, bars and restaurants we need on the railways. The third factor is continuing like-for-like sales growth as air passenger traffic keeps growing.
All three factors were at play in the full-year figures to the end of September, even if there was some slowdown between the first and second halves. Like-for-likes were up by 3 per