The Costley hotels group has staged a strong profit recovery after banking full insurance compensation for the fire that ravaged the historic Souter Johnnie's venue last year.
The 'House of Burns' at Kirkoswald is to reopen on October 1 after a rebuild and redevelopment, and the accounts just published show redress of £937,427 for fire destruction and loss of earnings, some £120,000 higher than the exceptional and write-off costs of the disaster in the 2012 financial year.
The year saw C & C, Ayrshire's biggest private employer, lift pre-tax profits from £50,293 to £326,189, on turnover down by 2.5% at £8.9 million, implying a rise in turnover excluding the closed outlet. The group's flagship hotels are the Lochgreen and Brig O'Doon, which recorded a "strong performance" helped by resilience in the "lucrative wedding market".
Operating profits improved from £379,903 to £609,930, and the positive cashflow helped the group to reduce debt from £9.3m to £9m. Employment however was affected by the closure, falling from 448 to 393.
The directors – headed by owners former Kilmarnock chairman Bill Costley and his wife Cath – said the Scottish hotel and leisure sector continued to suffer considerably from challenging trading conditions.
"The Costley group has the advantage of a strong reputation for quality and service and this, together with careful management controls and diversification, has meant that the group has remained relatively buoyant during difficult times".
The group's recent focus has been on developing the patisserie and chocolatier business in Prestwick, which now manufactures all the ice cream, cakes and chocolate sold in the group's outlets. The directors said the operation "highlights the culture of the group in demonstrating our philosophy of producing and manufacturing all that we serve within our hotels".
They said rebuilding at House of Burns, reopened after a £1m restoration in 2008, was well progressed. The new lay-out will integrate a tearoom and bakehouse in a rethatched restaurant block and have space for leasing.
Shareholders Mr and Mrs Costley each took a £50,000 dividend last year, and the highest paid director's remuneration rose from £84,031 to £87,164.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article