Member Article

Yorkshire's restaurants outperforming counterparts across the UK

In a boost for Yorkshire’s hospitality sector, a report has revealed that restaurants in the area are outperforming their counterparts across the country according to research by R3, the insolvency trade body.

Just under 35% of the region’s restaurants have a higher than normal risk of insolvency, the smallest proportion in any region in England and Wales, followed by the North West (35.2%) while the highest levels were seen in the West Midlands (43%).

Yorkshire is one of only two regions which have seen a fall in the rate of high risk businesses in the sector over the last five months.

R3 uses research compiled from Bureau van Dijk’s ‘Fame’ database of company information to track the number of businesses in key regional sectors that have a heightened risk of entering insolvency in the next year.

William Ballmann, chair of insolvency trade body R3 in Yorkshire and partner at national law firm Gateley LLP, said: “The beginning of an economic recovery should see an improvement in the fortunes of the leisure industry as people will have more money in their pockets to spend on going out.

“It is encouraging to see that restaurants in our region are already starting to feel the benefit of returning consumer confidence and this is likely to be further boosted by the much-heralded arrival of the Yorkshire Grand Depart in July.

“The pub industry still has some headwinds to deal with: they generally run on tighter margins than most other businesses, meaning they’re often likely to be treading a financial tightrope.

“An overall decrease in High Street footfall and the smoking ban have created challenges for the pub industry too. The 1p cut in beer duty announced in the Budget will be welcomed by pubs in our region though.”

Over the last five months, hotels in Yorkshire have also seen a fall in businesses deemed to be at a higher than normal risk of insolvency and are now among the best performing sectors in the region.

Despite the strength of the region’s restaurants compared to the rest of the country, Yorkshire’s restaurants are showing more signs of financial distress than many other local sectors: only pubs (36%) and IT firms (36%) have a higher proportion of businesses showing signs of distress.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Clare Burnett .