“In consumer goods sales, increasing the sales of fish to a whole new level was a great success. We started to develop the selection and quality of domestic fish products in our stores in May, and our customers have welcomed these changes in an unprecedented manner. There is a demand for ecological and healthy products, which can be seen in the historically high growth numbers of this individual product group. Fish sales have continued week after week with a 20-percent increase compared to previous year,” says Taavi Heikkilä, the CEO of SOK.

As a whole, S Group’s consumer goods sales in Finland increased by 1.2% and stood at EUR 3,604 million.

During the first half of the year, S Group’s travel and hospitality business saw the quickest growth. In addition to the busy hotel trade, restaurants achieved good results in this highly competitive business area. Besides introducing new and interesting restaurant brands, we have also successfully managed to renew the old favourites, such as the Rosso and Amarillo restaurant chains. In particular, casual eating is still growing in popularity, and S Group has a diverse range of their own chains and cooperation with franchising partners to help us meet this demand.

The mandatory markings of origins of meat products used in restaurants were welcomed with open arms in S Group. This transparency highlights our commitment to Finnish products. The ABC restaurants, for example, have only used Finnish meat for years.

The total sales of the travel and hospitality industry reached EUR 398 million during the beginning of the year, growing 3.0 percent in comparison to last year. The restaurant sales’ growth was 2.7 percent.

S Group's tax-free retail sales 1–6/2019

*This number includes the sales of consumer goods in Finland, Russia and Estonia.

**This number includes the hotel and restaurant sales in Finland, Russia and Estonia.

S Group’s and SOK Corporation’s interim reports will be published on Wednesday 07/08/2019.