Pub company JD Wetherspoon hopes to open an additional “four or five” outlets in Scotland by next spring.
The business, which already has more than 70 pubs in Scotland, said plans for a new Edinburgh site along with one in East Kilbride are at the most advanced stage.
It is also looking closely at premises in Largs, Stirling, Leven and Hamilton.
Chairman and founder Tim Martin said: “There is a number in the pipeline.”
That came as Wetherspoon, which employs almost 35,000 around the UK, reported record annual revenue of £1.51 billion for the 12 months to July 26.
That was up more than seven per cent from the £1.41bn recorded in the prior year.
Underlying pre-tax profits dipped two per cent from £79.4m to just short of £78m with Mr Martin stating his satisfaction with the performance as “we are still earning a buck”.
The annual dividend was maintained at 12p.
Like-for-like sales increased 3.3 per cent although that was slower than the 5.5 per cent expansion seen in the prior year.
Bar sales were up 1.2 per cent and food sales by 7.3 per cent although gambling machine sales continued to fall, ending down 2.8 per cent.
The company took exceptional charges of £12.6m in the year which included an £11.2m impairment on underperforming pubs.
Mr Martin acknowledged the trading environment has been tougher in recent months and warned the pub industry as a whole will have to raise prices to cope with legislation such as the minimum wage increases as well as competition from cheap supermarket booze deals.
He pointed out the company had raised the minimum hourly rate for staff by five per cent in October and a further eight per cent in July. On top of that it pays around 40 per cent of profits as bonuses or shares with around four-fifths going to staff in its pubs.
Mr Martin said: “We will try not to [raise prices] but speaking of the pub industry as a whole it is inevitable than prices will go up and more than they will do in supermarkets.
“We will do as much as we can to keep our prices as low as possible and pay our staff as much as we reasonably can.”
Mr Martin stated the pricing pressure are more likely to be felt in less affluent areas and smaller towns that in city centres.
The company is also looking at adding hotel rooms to more of its pubs with a possible 73-bed hotel above its Crystal Palace on Jamaica Street in Glasgow one of its flagship developments.
It also has rooms at sites in Peebles, Dunfermline, Broughty Ferry, Edinburgh, Fraserburgh and Glenrothes.
Mr Martin said: “In the old days we often developed the lower parts of a building and left the upper parts empty. We find the upper parts can deteriorate a bit.
“So if we can possibly afford it then it is better to build hotel rooms where we can.”
Mr Martin reiterated his stance that pubs are taxed excessively particularly on food sales when compared to supermarkets.
He said: “Supermarkets pay virtually no VAT in respect of food sales, whereas pubs pay 20 per cent - and this disparity enables supermarkets to subsidise their alcoholic drinks sales to the detriment of pubs and restaurants.”
Like-for-like sales in the six weeks to September 6 increased 1.4 per cent with total sales rising 5.2 per cent.
Mr Martin said he was not expecting an impact from the forthcoming Rugby World Cup in England which would materially affect its annual results.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here