Multinational hotel, coffee shop and restaurant company Whitbread has seen an 18.5% rise in annual pre-tax profit.
The company behind Costa Coffee, Premier Inn and various pub chains, also delivered a 11.1% rise in revenue and its underlying pre-tax profit rose to £488.1 million after strong sales at Costa.
There had been suggestions that Whitbread would sell Costa, which was started by the Costa brothers in 1971, however, Whitbread has now insisted it will hold on to the coffee chain.
"We have absolutely no plans [to sell Costa]", said chief executive, Andy Harrison. "We've laid out plans to grow Costa again by 80% over the next five years."
Whitbread also plans to grow its Premier Inn business from around 60,000 rooms to 85,000 over the next five years.
In other news, Whitbread added that their chief executive, Andy Harrison, is to leave the company in July and will become chairman at home furnishing retailer Dunelm. He joined Whitbread's board in 2010 from easyJet.
