Nightclub and bar operator Eclectic Clubs & Bars has posted a 57 per cent increase in pre-tax profits.

Announcing its full-year results to May, the company said that sales were up 12 per cent and like-for-like sales inched up by 3 per cent.

Eclectic accredited the increase in sales to its three successful refits and new openings, which achieved their targeted, annual cash-on-cash returns of 25 per cent and 30 per cent respectively.

The company's Sakura units, which opened in Lincoln in October 2007 and in Reading in May 2008, both exceeded these targets with returns of 56 per cent and 54 per cent in their first two years of trading.

In its financial statement, Eclectic also revealed that its Embargo 59 club, in London's Chelsea, which was refurbished in June 2009, has traded strongly from the first day of reopening and has already fully repaid its investment costs, leaving it on track to deliver a return of 130 per cent at the end of its first year.

The group plans to continue its expansion push with a number of new developments.

Planning and licensing consents have been agreed for a third Sakura in Manchester and the company's existing unit in Brighton re-opens in July as 'Lola Lo', a new-format Polynesian-themed bar and club.

Negotiations are currently ongoing in respect of a number of other, as yet unnamed, locations.