Reel success for cinema owners

ONE MORE THINGTHIS YEAR promises to be a bumper one for Irish cinema owners, helped by the release of the Sex and the City movie and the fourth film in the Indiana Jones series, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Accounts filed recently for Dublin Cinema Group Ltd, one of a number of companies operated by the Ward Anderson group, show that last year was none too shabby either, in spite of a lack of blockbuster releases.

The company, which operates the Savoy and Screen cinemas, made a pretax profit of €1.05 million in the year to the end of October 2007.

This was 11.7 per cent better than the previous 12 months.

This left the group with retained profits of €19.4 million at the end of the period.

The owners paid themselves a dividend of €100,000, the same level as 2006.

Interestingly, directors' emoluments declined last year to €300,000 from €350,000 in the previous 12-month period.

Last year's payment comprised remuneration and other payments of €250,000, and "compensation for loss of office" of €50,000, although no details are provided of who received this money.

The accounts show that founders Kevin Anderson and Leo Ward resigned during the year as directors.

Their sons, both named Paul, are listed as owning 250 ordinary shares each.

Remarkably, in this age of pay inflation, Dublin Cinema Group's wage bill for its 78 workers declined by almost €80,000 to €1.4 million in the course of the year - a reduction of about 5 per cent.

It's a trick that employers around the country would no doubt love to copy.