BARRHEAD Travel has its eye on adding several stores in England over the next year as it moves closer to announcing a first branded high street location in the north of the country.

That came as the independent travel operator said its pre-tax profits rose more than five per cent from £1.82 million to £1.91m in its most recent financial year.

Annual accounts recently lodged at Companies House will show gross turnover rose almost 28 per cent from £192.2m to £245.9m in 2014.

Majority shareholder and chief executive Sharon Munro said the business had benefited from the addition of foreign exchange bureaus in almost all of its 58 high street locations.

She also cited the five shops opened in 2013 and the three sites which were relocated to larger premises.

She said: “When we open a store you have all those costs for the first few months and the way travel works you don’t actually earn the profits until the holiday departs. The investment from 2013 [we] saw the rewards for that in 2014.”

The additional space on the high street alongside its growing online presence helped cruise revenue grow 18 per cent, long-haul by 24 per cent and short haul by 13 per cent.

Ms Munro, whose father Bill founded the company 40 years ago and remains a shareholder, said popular destinations included Dubai, the United States and Majorca.

The cruise business had benefited from more families taking up all-inclusive packages along with the increasing popularity of river cruise holidays.

Across 2014 total passenger numbers rose 14 per cent to just short of 294,000.

Mr Munro, who recently won the outstanding contribution by a business leader category at The Herald’s Inspiring City Awards, said: “In the face of challenging conditions across the industry which saw many people choosing to stay in Scotland and experience the excitement of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games and the Ryder Cup, we have enjoyed another very successful year.

“2014 saw us increase revenue across the board and passenger numbers grew significantly due to our continued investment in our stores and our websites.

Ms Munro, who staged a management buyout of the business from her father in 2007, said the location of the first Barrhead flagship store in England would be revealed in the next few weeks and indicated an appetite for further expansion.

She said: “We are really excited about this as it will hopefully be the start of lots more stores throughout the whole of England.

“We have a few other places in mind once we have this one up and running.”

Barrhead, which has its headquarters in Glasgow and employs around 850, is also fitting out two new shops in Edinburgh including one at the city’s airport.

Ms Munro said trading in 2015 had initially been difficult but had picked up in recent months.

She said: “The bad weather saw what we call the ‘sod it’ factor kicking in and a lot of people decided to go away.

“So it is turning out to be a positive year and we are on track with our budgets. For this coming winter passenger numbers are up about 32 per cent and for next summer in passenger numbers we are already trading about 16 per cent up.”

Barrhead also intends to extend its direct flights programme by adding a link from Glasgow to Genoa between May 29 and October 2 next year.

Ms Munro added: “We are continuing to reinvest back into the business. We are always trying to offer our customers in store or online an enhanced experience.”