Listed food retailer, The Spar Group has installed diesel generators at four of its six distribution centres, with generators to be installed at the remaining two distribution centres by financial year end, it said on Wednesday.

"The group is confident that it has adequate plans in place to cope with loadshedding and is actively encouraging retailer members to review their ability to trade in the event of power outages."

The group released its unaudited interim results for the six months ended 31 March 2008 on Wednesday.

Despite the recent contraction in the economy, the Spar Group was able to show robust results.

Comparable turnover was up 24.3 percent; operating profit showed a 24.8 percent increase and headline earnings per share, at 201 cents, were 28.7 percent up on the comparable period last year.

Spar Group cheif executive, Wayne Hook, said the favourable results were due mainly to strong volume growth in distribution activity and buoyant trading at Spar retailer level.

"Increased volumes are a major factor driving our growth," he said.

"Our aggressive new store opening programme and upgrades to existing stores is really working for us. Our retailers are upping their game and we're seeing strong organic growth from existing retail outlets."

Fifteen new Spar stores were opened during the period, taking the total number of Spar stores to 817.

As at the end of March, the group serviced 197 Superspars, 463 Spars and 157 Kwikspar stores.

Total Spar retail trading space increased by 2.4 percent to 798 797m².

In addition, 85 Spar stores have undergone major upgrades.

The group had in place an ambitious new store opening programme for the remainder of the financial year, it said.

However, in its outlook, the company said that food inflation which was running at 10.3 percent for the period under review - but spiked to around 14 percent in March, was a worry.

In addition, Hook said increases in interest rates and fuel prices rises were likely to continue to dent consumer spending.

However, he reckoned that Spar's performance for the remainder of the 2008 financial would be "satisfactory".

Sapa