Wagamama owner secures £500m of fresh debt for life post-Covid

Wagamama and Frankie & Benny’s owner The Restaurant Group has secured £500m of new long-term debt as it prepares for the return of restaurant dining. The group has secured a £380m loan facility to 2026 and a £120m super senior revolving credit facility to 2025. Both will be used to repay and refinance in full all of the group’s debt facilities, which are due to reach maturity in July next year. The new debt facilities also provide for “significant covenant headroom” with the group now subject only to a minimum liquidity covenant set at £40m (versus £50m under the existing facility) until 30 June 2022. The group, which will announce its full-year results on 10 March, said it expected net debt for the period to be around £340m as a result of burning through around £5.5m of cash per four-week period of national lockdown. Despite that, the group was upbeat that it would be able to reopen dine-in trading within two weeks of current restrictions being lifted and said that it currently had around 200 sites trading for delivery and takeaway. It said the trading performance of those sites in the current financial year had been “very encouraging” with average standalone delivery and takeaway sales between 2.5x and 5.0x pre-Covid-19 levels.   To send feedback, e-mail samantha.mcclary@egi.co.uk or tweet @samanthamcclary or @estatesgazette Photo by Petra Figueroa/SOPA Images/Shutterstock