Marston’s has delivered a third consecutive year of “significant profit growth” as the UK hospitality prepares to reveal its full-year results next month.

The company, which has an estate of more than 1,300 pubs, announced in its trading update for the 52-week period to 26 September 2026 that underlying profit before tax was expected to be “above the top end of market expectations”.

Marston’s highlighted its new pub formats as what it calls a proven engine of growth, with the ‘Grandstand’ format he standout performer.

Like-for-like sales improved to broadly flat in Q4, supported by new pub formats, stronger summer trading and also an excellent World Cup, it said in a statement.

Justin Platt, CEO of Marston’s PLC, commented: “We have delivered a third consecutive year of significant profit growth, margin improvements and strong recurring free cash flow. Our differentiated pub formats continue to drive excellent returns, and our guest satisfaction scores show that we continue to delight our customers – a credit to our talented, hard-working teams.

“Our progress over the last three years shows the momentum we have as a high margin, highly cash generative local pub company, with profits substantially up and debt levels halved. With clear strategic priorities and our new format conversion programme expanding to at least 100 pubs next year, we enter the new year well set to drive our next phase of growth.”