The Gala Coral Group is struggling to get itself out of growing debt, and
last week showed figures of the company being 4.4 billion GBP in debt, up 2
billion GBP from last year. Nevertheless, company management ensured the public
that the group would continue to grow and prosper, despite these figures.
In a statement following last week's financial report, the Chief Executive,
Dominic Harrison said: "Last year was challenging for Gala Coral due to
well tracked regulatory control and economic impacts. I believe though that the
group responded well to these challenges and I am particularly pleased with the
growth delivered by Coral - our main business. We have started the new financial
year well and I am confident we will continue to outperform our competitors and
meet the targets we have set ourselves in 2009."
Industry watchers, however, have expressed their concerns about the
situation, especially after private equity backers, Permira, Cinven and Condova
injected nearly 125 million GBP into the company.
Much of Gala Coral's losses were put down to redundancy costs as the company
proceeds with plans to close down around 10% of its businesses, including
casinos and bingo halls in the United Kingdom.
The Guardian, the UK newspaper, said: "Gambling group, Gala Coral, one of
Britain's largest private equity owned employers, has seen losses more than
treble as trading at its casino and bingo divisions has continued to slow
sharply leaving the business straining to service its huge debts."
