Greggs has extended its lead over rival bakery, café and takeaway outlets in the BB75 league table.

British Baker’s six-monthly update reveals that second-placed Subway has only notched up one extra shop this year taking its total to 1,410 while Greggs’ grand total is 1,437, up 18 since January. In 2009, Subway was only 10 outlets behind Greggs, but the difference is now 27-stores.

Greggs, which makes its own products, unlike Subway and the big coffee chains, is set to continue to dominate retail bakery, with plans to add another 600 stores in the next few years.

But third-placed Costa is snapping at the pair’s heels and has been the busiest in the last six months, opening 72 outlets. It raced away from rival Starbucks, and plans to have another 130 stores by the end of 2011.

Caffè Nero also cranked up the pace, upping its total by 40 to 440 branches in the UK, and aims to open another 45 over the rest of 2010. With store growth up 10%, the coffee chain has the highest growth rate of the outlets in the top 10. Director Paul Ettinger said trading so far this year had been positive, with like-for-like sales growth in excess of 2%. "The market is very stable, the laws of economics state that there is room for three strong competitors and it is incredibly difficult for others to break in," he said.

A surprise success story was BB’s Coffee & Muffins which now has 100 shops up from 50 in January. It went into administration last year and, since then, former franchisees have been buying up its stores.

l See pages 14-15 for the full BB75 update.

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