Families swap restaurant dining for Greggs as cost of living bites
IT HAS conquered UK high streets with its sausage rolls, steak bakes and breakfast baguettes, but now Greggs is enjoying a surge in demand for evening meals.
The bakery chain said early evening is now the fastest growing part of its daily trade, with pizzas and sides such as potato wedges becoming increasingly popular as the cost of living crisis hits households’ spending power.
Almost a quarter of Greggs’ 2,300 shops now stay open until 8pm after it first began trialling evening meals in 2019.
Roisin Currie, chief executive of Greggs, said families were looking to make their money go further as soaring inflation pushes up the price of everything from groceries to energy.
She said: “[Pizza has] a winning price point. A slice of pizza and a drink [from Greggs] is £2.40. If you’re on your way home from work, on your way to the cinema or meeting friends, that’s a great proposition.”
Ms Currie added that the company was now considering growing the number of its stores that operate on a 24-hour basis, including at its drive-through sites. It came as Greggs posted an 18pc jump in like-for-like sales during the final three months of 2022, compared with a year earlier.
Greggs opened its first store in 1951 in Newcastle. After struggling to compete against rivals such as Costa and Subway at the beginning of the past decade, it has transformed its fortunes in recent years.
That has been largely thanks to demand for its sausage rolls and a vegan alternative to the pastry it launched in 2019.
In an update to investors yesterday, Greggs said sales for 2022 are expected to total £1.5bn, a 23pc jump on a year earlier and more than double the level in 2010.
However, soaring inflation means Greggs has been forced to raise the price of some items.
Ms Currie emphasised this would generally be no more than 5p to 10p added to the cost of affected goods.
Ms Currie said the company was also planning to expand on its vegan range .
And it was working on being able to offer a plant-based alternative to every menu item which currently contains meat.