Turtle Bay serves up another record year after championing four-day week

Caribbean restaurant and bar chain Turtle Bay has reported another record year and hailed the success of its switch to a four-day working week for its employees.

The Bristol-headquartered business, which was set up in 2010 by Ajith Jaya-Wickrema and Stephen Entwistle, has reported a turnover of £93.6m for March 31, 2024, up from £90.1m.

According to newly filed documents with Companies House, the firm’s pre-tax profit was cut from £9.9m to £1.8m. The prior year’s total had been boosted by insurance proceeds of £6.4m.

At the start of the financial year Turtle Bay, which is backed by private equity firm Piper, allowed its entire salaried restaurant team to reduce their number of working days from five to four with no loss of pay.

The company said the take-up has been “phenomenal and the feedback has been overwhelming”.

During the year the average number of people employed by Turtle Bay rose from 2,097 to 2,147.

Turtle Bay suffers London and Midlands fall

A statement signed off by the board said: “Unlike many of our competitors, we bounced back quicker and stronger following the pandemic and experienced industry-leading like-for-like growth in our estate with further like-for-like growth the year after.

“It was always going to be hard against these tough comparatives, such as our like-for-like sales declined by 3.9 per cent.

“Our sales in the last year continue to outstrip pre-pandemic by 27.7 per cent on a like-for-like basis.”

Turtle Bay added that it experienced a stronger performance in the North of England, South Coast and the South West than in the Midlands and London.

It said: “The economic squeeze, brought on by the unprecedented headwinds of high energy costs, double-digit inflation and high interest rates have hurt our key guest base more than others.

“The fall in disposable income has not been felt evenly across the UK’s regions and societies.

“We introduced non-uniform pricing across our restaurants to better align good value across the communities in which we operate.”

Additionally, the Caribean restaurant and bar chain also stated that it continues to “run a tight ship, investing only what we generate back into the business”.

The company invested £8.4m in new and existing sites during the year and also opened its first location in Scotland in December. It also opened venues in Camden, Blackpool and Lincoln, creating over 150 jobs.

Regarding its current financial year, Turtle Bay said: “The new year has started in line with expectations.” However, the company did admit that the “economic environment remains extremely tough”.

“Despite the fall in inflation to more manageable levels, consumer essentials such as food costs, energy, rents and mortgage rates remain 20 per cent more than two years ago,” added Turtle Bay.