Big Yellow boss has ‘no complaints’ as profit soars

Self-storage company Big Yellow Group posted a near-tripling of profit as its chairman said the company can have “no complaint” about the performance of the business during the pandemic. The group generated revenue of £135.2m during the year to 31 March, up by 4.6% year-on-year. Statutory pretax profit was given a huge boost by revaluation gains on investment properties, rising by 185% to £265.8m. Adjusted pretax profit was £74.6m, a lift of 5%. Executive chairman Nicholas Vetch said the structural need for self-storage is now “embedded” in the UK. “We can have no complaint as to the performance of the business over the last year,” he added. “Risks remain and therefore, as always, we remain cautious. There are, however, reasonable grounds to have confidence in our business model having navigated two external crises of considerable proportion since the global financial crisis. “This pandemic has accelerated many structural changes that were already occurring, such as the move to online retailing and an increase in working from home facilitated by technological advances. These developments, combined with the shortage of quality flexible mini-warehousing space, from which to operate small-scale storage and e-fulfilment is helping to drive our demand. We believe these are long-term trends.” The company acquired four new London development sites during the year, in Wapping, Staines, Epsom and Kentish Town, comprising an estimated self-storage development cost of £106m. Big Yellow now has a pipeline of 14 sites totalling about 1m sq ft, eight of which have planning consent. To send feedback, e-mail tim.burke@eg.co.uk or tweet @_tim_burke or @EGPropertyNews