WH Smith PLC on Thursday lauded a significant recovery in its revenue performance for the most recent financial year.

WH Smiths is a books and stationary retailer that operates on UK high streets as well as in travel locations such as airports and train stations globally.

For the year that ended on August 31, revenue surged to £1.40 billion from £886 million the previous year ‘thanks to a robust recovery across its travel markets’, the company explained. The revenue figure is the highest annual top-line number reported by the firm since 2006, it added.

WH Smith also swung to a pretax profit of £63 million in the year, from a loss of £116 million a year prior.

As a result of its strong trading and its confidence in the future, the company declared the resumption of a final dividend at 9.1 pence.

Chief Executive Officer Carl Cowling said: ‘2022 has been a successful year for WHSmith and we enter the new financial year with the Group in its strongest ever position as a global travel retailer with multiple growth opportunities across the world. We have opened 98 new stores in the year and we have a pipeline of 150 new stores yet to open across 16 countries and in airports as varied as Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Brussels, Oslo and Melbourne.’

WH Smith added that total travel revenue amounted to £927 million from £401 million the year before.

Shares were up 3.5% at 1,331.67 pence each on Thursday morning in London.

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