Townsend, who is to replace Ted Tuppen as chief executive in May, explained the benefit of a more interventionist approach in one area, Wakefield in West Yorkshire, where it had 13 pubs within a mile of the town centre that in FY2012 delivered a 20% decline in net income.
He said the company closed one pub, invested £280,000 “transforming” seven, converted two to its Beacon managed tenancy and changed five publicans. The 12 remaining outlets delivered estimated like-for-like growth of 7% in 2013 and a return on investment of 15%.
Townsend said this proved the company “might have the time and the opportunity to consider how different operating models might be applied to our estate”.
Income streams
Townsend said the increasing proportion of food-led sales in total profit “means we have to find a way of securing these growing income streams by considering alternative income models, such as franchises, turnover-related rent, or even directly managed operations, particularly at the upper end of our estate”.
He said one end of its estate is “simply not going to attract the very best quality publicans due to their profit potential”, so it is necessary to explore “alternative models” where Enterprise takes “more control”.
He also conceded that the possibility of intervention by Government “may again make the leased operating model unattractive”.
He added: “This is very much developing thinking at this stage but I would expect to be able to report further on our findings and our plans when we report our interim results for FY14 in May.”
Townsend said the tenanted and leased model would “remain core” for “the majority of our pubs”, however.
Online ordering
Meanwhile, Townsend revealed: “In the year ahead we will launch our new digital platform, which will enable online ordering, payment transactions and communications, all designed to reduce the burden of back office distractions for our publicans to allow then to focus even more of their attention on front of house sales.”
He revealed that 1,518 pubs have signed up for its free wi-fi service, with 215 installed. In total 495 pubs have signed up for the new Sky deal that the pubco has negotiated, saving £3,000 per pub.
Townsend added: “I believe we offer the biggest selection of drinks products available to any pubs in the UK, all of which can be ordered via one phone call delivered on one vehicle.”
In total more than 1,400 cask ales are offered from 489 brewers.