Whitbread's pub restaurants delivered a 7.9% increase in like-for-like covers for the year to 26 February chiefly driven by its value food offers.
The company, which also owns Premier Inn and Costa Coffee, delivered a 9.3% rise in profit before tax and exceptionals to £229.9m for the year. Total revenue across the business was up 9.7% to £1,334.6m with group like-for-like sales up 4.9%. Underlying profit before tax was up 12% at £228.2m.
Whitbread has 372 pub restaurants — 130 Beefeaters, 130 Brewers Fayres, 105 Table Tables and seven all-you-can-eat Taybarns. A total of with 328 are now on joint hotel sites.
Sales at the division were up 3.2% to £460.1m with a 4.6% increase in like-for-like sales fuelled by new menus and improved environments. The average spend per head on food was £7.46.
Whitbread chief executive Alan Parker said its pub restaurants had made "good progress" over the year after moving quickly to introduce value food offers in response to food inflation. "Value for money is at the heart of our joint site model, where guests can experience both great value hotel stays and meals at affordable prices," he said.
"This model continues to drive superior returns. Each of our restaurant brands has distinctive value for money propositions, such as the two main meals for £9 at Brewers Fayre.
"We continue to drive sales through these everyday attractive prices and introduce new menus across Beefeater, Table Table and Brewers Fayre."
He added: "Meanwhile, at Taybarns it costs from as little as £5.95 for a three course meal and we will continue to learn from the initial roll-out of seven sites in order to plan the next phase at the appropriate time."
It refurbished 42 Brewers Fayres in the year and has targeted a further 80 for an update over the next year at a cost of around £10m.