Applegreen has announced that it has secured additional funding for its motorway services subsidiary Welcome Break to enhance its liquidity during the Covid-19 crisis.
Applegreen has announced that it has secured additional funding for its motorway services subsidiary Welcome Break to enhance its liquidity during the Covid-19 crisis.
In a liquidity and trading update it revealed Welcome Break has repurposed £25m of a dedicated capital expenditure facility in its existing banking arrangements into a revolving credit facility which is available to draw down for any purpose. The lenders to Welcome Break have also agreed to relax or remove covenant condition up to and including June 2021.
It said Welcome Break has traded in line with its Covid-19 projections for both May and June and has now reopened a significant number of its food and beverage offers to meet demand as travel restrictions started to ease from early June.
The statement continued: “Traffic volumes on the UK motorway road network are continuing to recover and current traffic flows are back to over 65% of 2019 volumes. We welcome the UK government’s recent announcement which will see further substantial lifting of restrictions from 4 July 2020 which we expect to drive further traffic increases on the road network.
“At 26 June 2020, Welcome Break had over £30m in available cash in addition to the new undrawn facilities of £25m. The Welcome Break business has substantial liquidity and is expected to be cashflow positive in June, leaving the business well positioned ahead of the important summer season.”
It added that the remainder of the Applegreen business has continued to trade ahead of its Covid-19 projections for May and June, aided by strong store sales in the local petrol filling station sites, good fuel margins and extensive cost saving measures. Cash balances in this part of the business at 26 June 2020 were in excess of €60m with undrawn facilities of approximately €64m.
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