Sourdough pizza restaurants chain Franco Manca slipped into the red despite its turnover rising after opening 13 new sites across the UK.
Newly-filed accounts with Companies House revealed that the London-headquartered brand made a pre-tax loss of £413,000 for the year to March 26, 2023, having posted a profit of £4.3m in the prior 12 months.
However, the results also show that Franco Manca’s turnover increased over the same period from £53.3m to £64.5m.
A statement signed off by the board said: “The company operates in a competitive and fragmented market which regularly sees new concepts come to the market.
“However, the directors believe that the strength of the company’s existing restaurant brand, value offer and constant striving towards delivering the best product and service will help the business to mitigate competitive risk.”
During the year, Franco Manca opened 13 restaurants and closed two of its sites – taking the total number of locations it operates to 70.
As a result of its expansion, the average number of people Franco Manca employed during the year surged from 1,086 to 1,407.
The London-headquartered has 36 sites across the capital as well as restaurants in Birmingham, Bishop’s Stortford, Bath, Bournemouth, Brighton, Bristol, Canterbury, Cheltenham, Chichester, Exeter, Guildford, Hove, Oxford, Plymouth, Southampton, Cambridge, Lincoln, Peterborough, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Cardiff, Manchester, Leeds, Northern Ireland and Spain.
The latest accounts for Franco Manca’s parent company, Fulham Shore, are overdue to be filed with Companies House.
As well as Franco Manca, Fulham Shore owns The Real Greek chain. In July 2023, the group was acquired by Japanese food conglomerate Toridoll for £93.4m.
Speaking to City A.M. in January 2024, the new boss of Franco Manca said that a restaurant business cannot be run off a spreadsheet and that it had been a “tough year” for the sector but that his business had been able to push ahead.
Published separately, accounts for The Real Greek show the chain’s turnover increased from £29.4m to £35.9m in the year to March 26, 2023, while it went from making a pre-tax profit of £3.6m to a loss of £394,000.