Accounts to February 2025 and December 2025 · Filed 2025 and 2026
Nando's v Wagamama: Two high street institutions, two recipes for success: who wins on the books?
Three times the turnover, the same profit. Nando's Group Holdings reports £1,476m against £481m at Wagamama (Holdings), while estimated profit before tax lands level at £38m and £40m. The two year ends sit ten months apart, so this is two recent filings side by side rather than a like for like snapshot.
3.1x
Nando's turnover measured against Wagamama's, £1,476m to £481m
£38m v £40m
Estimated profit before tax, Nando's then Wagamama
£445m
The gap between the two net asset positions, minus £293m against £152m
The head to head
- Turnover
-
Nando's£1,476mWagamama£481m
Nando's 3.1x larger
- Employees
-
Nando's25,473Wagamama8,169
Nando's 3.1x larger
- Estimated profit before tax
-
Nando's£38mWagamama£40m
Wagamama ahead by £2m
- Net assets
-
Nando's(£293m)Wagamama£152m
£445m apart
- Estimated borrowings
-
Nando's£478mWagamama£546m
Wagamama higher by £68m
- Direction of travel
-
Nando's turnover+8.0%Wagamama turnover-4.2%
Both moved from a loss to a profit
Year ends ten months apart: Nando's to February 2025, Wagamama to December 2025.
The takeaway
- The scale gap is 3.1 times, and it is the same on both measures. Nando's turns over £1,476m to Wagamama's £481m, and employs 25,473 people to Wagamama's 8,169. Sales and staff scale together almost exactly.
- Profit lands level, so the margins do not. Estimated profit before tax is £38m at Nando's and £40m at Wagamama. As a share of turnover that is 2.6 per cent against 8.3 per cent, a margin roughly 3.2 times wider on the smaller business.
- Each chain gets almost identical output per person. Turnover per employee works out at £57,944 at Nando's and £58,881 at Wagamama, under £1,000 apart. Wagamama pays more per head, an average staff cost of £23,000 against £21,000.
- The balance sheets are opposites. Nando's reports net assets of minus £293m, Wagamama positive £152m. Yet the smaller chain carries the bigger loan book, £546m of estimated borrowings against £478m, which is 1.14 times its turnover against 0.32 times.
- They are moving in opposite directions. Nando's grew turnover 8.0 per cent and headcount 2.4 per cent. Wagamama's turnover fell 4.2 per cent and its headcount 9.4 per cent, and it still came out marginally ahead on profit.
Which is bigger, Nando's or Wagamama?
Nando's, by a factor of about three on every measure of size in the filings. Nandos Group Holdings Limited reported consolidated turnover of £1,476m for the year to February 2025, up 8.0 per cent, with 25,473 employees. Wagamama (Holdings) Limited reported £481m for the year to December 2025, down 4.2 per cent, with 8,169 employees.
The interesting part is how neatly the two ratios track each other. Turnover is 3.07 times larger at Nando's and headcount 3.12 times larger, which means revenue per person is close to identical: £57,944 at Nando's, £58,881 at Wagamama. Two very different menus, service models and price points, and the same output per pair of hands.
Where they separate is what that person costs. Wagamama's average staff cost is £23,000 a head against £21,000 at Nando's, about 9.5 per cent higher, and payroll absorbs 39.5 per cent of its turnover against 35.9 per cent at Nando's. Headcount is also moving the other way. Nando's added staff at 2.4 per cent over the year while Wagamama's fell 9.4 per cent.
Which chain made more profit?
Wagamama, narrowly, and on less than a third of the sales. Estimated profit before tax comes out at £40m against £38m at Nando's. Neither figure is large in the context of the turnover behind it, but they are arrived at very differently: 8.3 per cent of turnover at Wagamama, 2.6 per cent at Nando's.
Both are recoveries. The prior year comparatives in the filings show a £50m loss at Nando's and a £12m loss at Wagamama, so both moved from red to black. Nando's did it while growing, adding turnover and staff. Wagamama did it while shrinking, with sales and headcount both down and margin up.
One structural caution before reading too much into the two-point profit gap. The Nando's figure is a consolidated group number and the Wagamama figure comes from a single holding company inside a larger group, so the cost bases sitting behind them are not the same shape. Both are estimates derived from the filings rather than a stated profit line.
Where does each £100 of turnover go?
Payroll takes the largest slice on both sides, and then the two diverge on what is left. For every £100 of turnover, Nando's spends £35.91 on staff and keeps £2.57 as estimated profit before tax. Wagamama spends £39.50 on staff and keeps £8.32. Financing costs are close in relative terms, £7.59 against £8.52, despite the very different absolute interest bills.
- Payroll
- All other operating costs
- Interest payable
- Estimated profit before tax
Why are the two balance sheets opposites?
Because they sit in differently financed structures, not because one trades better than the other. Nando's reports net assets of minus £293m, Wagamama positive £152m, £445m apart. Cash is another contrast: £82m at Nando's against £9m at Wagamama, with current assets of £136m and £25m respectively.
The debt runs against the intuition set up by the turnover gap. Wagamama's estimated borrowings are the larger of the two at £546m, against £478m at Nando's. Relative to turnover that is 1.14 times for Wagamama and 0.32 times for Nando's, the sharpest divide on the page.
The interest bills then invert again. Nando's shows £112m of interest payable, close to three times its estimated profit before tax. Wagamama shows £41m, almost exactly one times its estimated profit, which is why a business with more borrowings carries less than half the absolute financing cost.
One off item
£39m of interest coming back in
Wagamama (Holdings) reports £39m of interest received against £41m payable, so its net interest cost for the year is about £2m. That pattern is typical of a company sitting in the middle of a group structure and lending on to entities below it, and it is the single biggest reason its profit holds up against a chain three times its size. Nando's reports £3m received against £112m payable, a net £109m.
Neither company paid a dividend. On both sides, whatever the year produced stayed inside the structure.
Who owns Nando's and who owns Wagamama?
One is held by an individual, the other by a private equity manager, and the filings show that difference plainly. What follows is control as recorded at Companies House, in bands, not stake sizes or prices.
Owned outright
Nandos Group Holdings Limited
Leslie Perlman, 75 to 100 per cent
An individual person with significant control, notified in April 2016. Incorporated in 2007, registered in south west London, filing under activities of head offices. Eleven officer records appear on the file, six of them current, with the longest serving appointments dating from 2008.
No charges are recorded against the company, so the £478m of estimated borrowings is not secured by registered debentures on this entity.
Investor backed
Wagamama (Holdings) Limited
Apollo Global Management, Inc., significant influence
A corporate person with significant control, notified in January 2025, which follows the private equity manager's acquisition of the wider Restaurant Group in December 2023. Incorporated in 2011, registered in south east London, filing under activities of other holding companies.
Ten charges appear on the file and nine are discharged. The outstanding one, dated January 2025, is held by U.S. Bank Trustees Limited. Earlier security in the same series covered the Wagamama trademark and named restaurant properties, which is a conventional shape for a lender to a branded estate.
Person with significant control data records who controls a company. It is not the accounting boundary, so it is used here for the ownership story only and never to combine or de-duplicate figures.
The numbers, side by side
Every figure below traces to one of the two filings, or is a ratio derived between them. Nothing is added across the two companies.
| Measure | Nando's | Wagamama | Relationship |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trading | |||
| Turnover | £1,476m | £481m | 3.1x |
| Turnover movement | +8.0% | -4.2% | Opposite directions |
| Estimated profit before tax | £38m | £40m | £2m to Wagamama |
| Prior year profit before tax | (£50m) | (£12m) | Both recovered |
| Estimated margin | 2.6% | 8.3% | 3.2x |
| People | |||
| Employees | 25,473 | 8,169 | 3.1x |
| Employee growth | +2.4% | -9.4% | Opposite directions |
| Staff costs | £530m | £190m | 2.8x |
| Average cost per head | £21,000 | £23,000 | £2,000 higher |
| Turnover per employee | £57,944 | £58,881 | £937 apart |
| Balance sheet | |||
| Net assets | (£293m) | £152m | £445m apart |
| Bank and cash | £82m | £9m | 9.1x |
| Current assets | £136m | £25m | 5.4x |
| Trade debtors | Not disclosed | £3m | Not comparable |
| Financing | |||
| Estimated borrowings | £478m | £546m | £68m to Wagamama |
| Borrowings to turnover | 0.32x | 1.14x | 3.5x |
| Interest payable | £112m | £41m | 2.7x |
| Interest received | £3m | £39m | 13x to Wagamama |
| Dividends | £0 | £0 | Level |
| Filing | |||
| Company number | 06451677 | 07556525 | |
| Year end | February 2025 | December 2025 | 10 months apart |
| Accounts submitted | November 2025 | May 2026 | |
| Consolidated | Yes | Not flagged | Not like for like |
| Incorporated | 2007 | 2011 | |
| Registered area | South west London | South east London | |
| Status | Active | Active | |
Negatives appear in brackets. Ratios and gaps describe the relationship between the two filings and are calculated from the unrounded figures.
Method
How this comparison was built
Figures come from Companies House filings for Nandos Group Holdings Limited (06451677), consolidated accounts to February 2025 and submitted November 2025, and Wagamama (Holdings) Limited (07556525), accounts to December 2025 and submitted May 2026. The two periods sit ten months apart and only the Nando's line is flagged as consolidated, so the pairing is not like for like and is not presented as such.
Profit before tax is an estimate derived from the filings rather than a stated line, and holding company costs mean group and subsidiary estimates do not reconcile exactly. Margin, turnover per employee, borrowings to turnover and the per £100 splits are our calculations from the filed figures. Where the residual band in the diagram is described as all other operating costs, it is what remains after payroll, interest payable and estimated profit before tax.
Nothing on this page adds the two companies together. Neither filing contains both businesses, so any combined figure would describe an entity that does not exist. Every number is either attributed to one company or expressed as a ratio or gap between the two. Ownership is taken from person with significant control data, which records control bands rather than exact stakes or prices, and is not used to combine financial figures. Context on the December 2023 change of ownership above Wagamama comes from public reporting rather than from the two filings.
Turnover reported as zero is read as not disclosed rather than nil, as is the case with trade debtors on the Nando's line. Figures are rounded to protect the precision of the source filings.
Frequently asked questions
Nando's is the bigger business on turnover. Nandos Group Holdings Limited reported consolidated turnover of £1,476m for the year to February 2025, about 3.1 times the £481m reported by Wagamama (Holdings) Limited for the year to December 2025. The headcount gap is almost identical, 25,473 against 8,169.
On estimated profit before tax the two are level, £38m at Nando's and £40m at Wagamama. Because Wagamama books that on less than a third of the turnover, its margin is 8.3 per cent against 2.6 per cent, roughly 3.2 times. Both figures are estimates derived from the filings.
The Nando's group filing shows net assets of minus £293m, which reflects how the group is financed rather than how it trades. It carries £478m of estimated borrowings and £112m of interest payable in the year. Wagamama (Holdings) shows positive net assets of £152m on £546m of estimated borrowings.
Companies House records an individual, Leslie Perlman, as holding 75 to 100 per cent of Nandos Group Holdings Limited, notified in April 2016. Wagamama (Holdings) Limited records Apollo Global Management, Inc. as a corporate person with significant influence, notified in January 2025. These are control bands, not stake sizes or prices.
Not exactly, and the page does not present them as like for like. The year ends are ten months apart, February 2025 against December 2025, and the Nando's line is consolidated group accounts while the Wagamama line is a single holding company that is not flagged as consolidated.
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