Portuguese retailer Sonae MC, which operates the Continente banner, has posted a 2.8% increase in like-for-like sales in full-year 2018.
Following a store expansion, overall turnover at the business was up 7.0% to €4.16 billion, while underlying EBITDA rose by €15 million to €228 million.
Sonae MC ended the years with a total of 1,085 stores, an increase of 122 on the previous year, while in the current year to date, it has already opened three additional Continente Bom Dia and one Continente Modelo stores.
The group's health and wellness operation also performed strongly, it said, and in early 2019, it completed the acquisition of a 60% stake in Arenal, a Spanish pharmacy and perfumery retailer.
Overall Performance
Overall, the Sonae Group posted a 8.1% increase in turnover to €5.95 billion, with growth reported across all its business units.
Underlying EBITDA across all operations grew 8.4%, while investment rose to €702 million, driven by organic expansion and acquisitions.
Last year, the group undertook several measures to streamline its business, said Ângelo Paupério, Sonae Co-CEO, who said that the year was "marked by the endeavour to optimise the Group's organisational structure, with a special focus on strengthening management teams, ensuring competencies and complementarities that enable greater levels of autonomy, agility and inherent accountability, thus creating the conditions to better respond to the growing challenges of ever-changing competitive landscapes".
© 2019 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Stephen Wynne-Jones. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: European Supermarket Magazine.
