Weather casts a cloud at Geest

POOR weather in May and June left lettuce sales limp at Geest, Britain's biggest producer of ready-to-eat salads, which warned that full-year operating profits are likely to be no higher than last year's.

Finance director Mark Pullen said: 'In the early part of the summer the growth we would normally expect suddenly went into reverse.'

Lettuce sales tumbled by 12% in May and were flat in June. But sales of other prepared food stuffs grew, leaving pre-tax profits slightly ahead at £18.2m for the six months to 30 June.

And as the sun returned in August so did demand for the green stuff. Like-for-like sales of bagged leaf lettuce last month were 20% ahead of last year.

New chairman Sir John Banham, presiding over his first set of interim results at Geest, said that the board's confidence remained undiminished and unveiled a 10% rise in the dividend to 7.25p.

Banham said: 'The underlying drivers of growth in our markets remain as potent as ever. We have every reason to believe that the dip in salad growth is a one-off blip.'

The shares rose 17 1/2p to 540p.