Hospitality industry furniture specialist Burgess Furniture has reported a return to sales growth as turnover surpassed £10m.

According to its latest filed accounts for the year ended 31 December 2022, total sales rose 90.5% to £10.1m from £5.3m in 2021. The previous period saw sales fall 26.3% from £7.2m in 2020.

UK sales were up 36% to £3.4m from £2.5m, while rest of the world sales were also up 148% to £6.7m from £2.7m.

Pre-tax losses resulted at £914,000, narrowing from a loss of £1.1m recorded in the previous year.

Stated within its report, the company said: “2022 has been very tricky year for the business with the slower return from the COVID-19 pandemic than expected and Russia Ukraine situation, however, the business continues to work hard in carrying out our business strategy. Management is looking to approve substantial pay increases to its staff as measure on retention of Burgess staff foreseen tighter labour market, which makes the recruitment a challenging task.

“Our joint venture in the USA, MTS Burgess Inc, managed to continue their operations to its best capacity under given tricky conditions faced by hospitality industry worldwide. HS Bankett Burgess GmbH (HSBB), a fully owned subsidiary also suffered heavily from the current market conditions.

“The business continues to regard its long serving employees as one of its most valuable assets. Company implemented the Cross Skilling programme allowing all staff to work in different departments, enabling the factory management to fully utilise the staffing capacity depending on the order requirements. This has immensely helped the factory Management to achieve deadlines during unstable demand patterns.”