Greggs pledges to ‘meet the headwinds’ of 2025 with value offering
CEO Roisin Currie acknowledges consumer confidence is low and there are cost pressures going into 2025, but says Greggs’ value positioning will help it address these challenges.
Greggs has asserted its ability to maintain its “value leadership” even amid inflationary pressures, as it reports double digit sales growth in 2024.
The bakery chain grew its sales 11.3% year-over-year to £2.01bn in the 52 weeks ended 28 December 2024. This growth builds on the 13.7% sales growth it achieved in 2023. Post-pandemic in 2022, Greggs’ sales were up 23% on 2021 levels, meaning the business has now driven three consecutive years of double-digit sales growth.
Updating investors today (9 January) CEO Roisin Currie acknowledged that “consumer confidence was subdued” in the second half of 2024. She said that reduced retail footfall towards the end of the year resulted in lower sales growth of 2.5% year-over-year for the fourth quarter. Since the bakery chain reported this figure earlier this morning, its London Stock Exchange shares have declined.
Looking to this year, the brand will face increased cost pressures, such as a rise in the National Living Wage, but it noted that this could also provide additional income to many consumers. But Currie noted that lower consumer confidence is still impacting expenditure and footfall. Despite this, she expressed confidence that Greggs is well-equipped to continue delivering “value leadership” while handling cost inflation.
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“Our value-for-money offer and the quality of our freshly-prepared food and drink position us well to meet the headwinds we expect to see in the year ahead,” Currie said.
To help “broaden the appeal” of the brand and drive growth among new and existing customers, Greggs will be leaning on “menu development, marketing and extension into new channels and dayparts”.
Over the festive season, it introduced Christmas products including its Festive Bake, the Vegan Festive Bake and the Festive Flatbread.
With regards to expanding its appeal across different dayparts, products like pizza are particularly impactful for reaching consumers in the evening. Greggs said it saw “pizza perform strongly” through the day and into the evening.
Back in 2021, Greggs set an ambitious target to double its revenue by 2026. Its 2021 revenue was £1.23bn, meaning that, at £2.01bn, Greggs has made good progress on this goal so far.
