Jollibee income slightly up in Q1

Jollibee Foods Corp. reported a net income of P1.47 billion in the first quarter of the year, up 2.9 percent on higher revenues.

Revenues rose 12.2 percent to P29.29 billion as systemwide retail sales also grew 12.2 percent to P38.53 billion.

“The sales growth was driven by new stores which contributed 7.2 percent and same stores sales growth of five percent,” JFC said in a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday.

For its Philippine brands, JFC generated strong sales growth of 11.8 percent of which 6.8 percent was contributed by store network growth and five percent from same store sales growth.

Similarly, the foreign business accelerated to a 13.7 percent growth from 8.7 percent in 2016.

Among the different foreign markets, JFC noted improvement in China, North America, Southeast Asia and the Middle East, particularly in China with the strong recovery of JFC’s biggest brand there, Yonghe King.

JFC’s 13.7 percent growth in foreign business includes its divestment in late 2016 of San Pin Wang in China and Jinja Bar in the US.

Excluding these divestments, the company’s foreign business grew 21.9 percent, China 13. 1 percent, North America 28.7 percent, Southeast Asia 33.7 percent and the Middle East 38.6 percent.

JFC’s foreign business accounts, including joint ventures, account for 30 percent of its global system wide sales and 20 percent without the partnerships.

As of Jan. 31, 2017, the JFC was operating 2,643 restaurant outlets in the country: Jollibee 979, Chowking 480, Greenwich 248, Red Ribbon 395, Mang Inasal 466 and Burger King 75.

Abroad, it was operating 616 stores: Yonghe King (China) 312, Hong Zhuang Yuan (China) 44, Dunkin’ Donuts (China) 15, Jollibee 169 (US 35, Vietnam 86, Brunei 14, Saudi Arabia 10, Qatar 6, UAE 5, Kuwait 4, Hong Kong 3, Singapore 4, Bahrain 1 and Canada 1), Red Ribbon in the US 34 and Chowking 42.