Northern Bear PLC on Friday said profit fell in the first half of its current financial year despite an uptick in revenue, as administrative expenses rose.

The Newcastle Upon Tyne, England-based specialist building and support services said pretax profit for the six months that ended September 30 was £1.5 million, down 13% from £1.7 million the year before.

This was primarily due to administrative expenses increasing 12% to £7.2 million from £6.4 million.

Revenue grew 1.9% to £37.6 million from £36.9 million, while cost of sales reduced 0.3% to £28.6 million from £28.7 million.

Chair Simon Carr said: ‘I am pleased to report that we remain in a strong financial position and have continued to make good progress against our medium-term objectives. This has been possible in the main by a combination of continued investment, organic growth and focus on cash generation, which has underpinned the results in the period.’

Looking ahead, Northern Bear said its current trading was in line with market expectations, though did not on Friday outline what those were.

Chief Executive Officer John Davies said: ‘Should the current market conditions continue and the additional investment in our operations meet expectations, the group has the potential to trade ahead of both prior year results and market expectations. This, of course, inter alia, is subject to winter weather conditions, as in the prior year we saw sustained heavy rainfall and a number of named storms which impacted on our operations and trading performance in the second half of financial 2024.’

Shares in Northern Bear were up 8.3% at 54.70 pence in London on Friday morning.

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