British Land reports footfall bouncing back after profit drop of more than a third

A UK property company has announced that its profits declined by more than a third over the past year.

British Land, which has properties spanning the country, saw underlying profit for the year drop by 34.3 per cent, which it said primarily reflects an increase in provisions for rent receivables.

Across the period, the company’s portfolio value has also decreased, dropping by 10.8 per cent, with offices down by 3.8 per cent and retail down by 24.7 per cent.

In the period since reopening, footfall and sales at the firm’s retail portfolio were 88 per cent and 104 per cent of pre pandemic levels respectively, excluding food businesses,

Simon Carter, CEO, commented: “This has been an extraordinary year so I am enormously proud of the resilient performance the team delivered, and the strong progress we have made across the priority areas I set out in November.

“Our new strategy exploits our competitive strengths in development, active management and repositioning assets and sees us invest behind two key themes, campuses and retail & fulfilment.

“In retail, we are expanding our approach to include fulfilment, building on our market leading position in high quality, out of town retail parks which already play a key role in retailers’ fulfilment models, and complementing this with development led investment in urban logistics, primarily in London.

“We see a value opportunity in retail parks, reflecting increased yields and a more stable occupational outlook.

“We have been further encouraged by how strongly footfall and sales have rebounded in recent weeks.

“While Covid-19 has clearly impacted our performance, with the portfolio value down 10.8 per cent, we have a strong balance sheet and have already delivered excellent progress against our four priorities.

“Looking forward, we will further align our business to growth and value, benefitting from the pick up in economic activity that is now emerging.

“On our campuses, we have an opportunity to introduce innovative growth sectors including life sciences at Regent’s Place.

“In retail & fulfilment we will continue to target value opportunities in retail parks and development-led logistics in London.

“We will maintain our focus on the everyday management of our spaces: driving rent collection, supporting our customers and making our space more sustainable.”