This announcement came as the group pegged annual results today at £305.5m (€380.5m) for the 15 months up to 31 March 2012. Its annual period was revised to run for 15 months as pooling results in December proved unrealistic with October to December the busiest trading period.
The RGFC group is comprised of bakery ingredients firm Renshaw, bakery manufacturer Haydens, independent European sugar distributor Napier Brown Foods (its biggest business) and dairy and bakery ingredients firm Garrett.
Pieter Totté, executive chairman of RGFC, said that while the whole group showed a strong performance, the Renshaw brand was its “hidden gem”.
“Renshaw has benefited from the growing interest in homebaking both in the UK and internationally and this growth has prompted us to review our vision for the brand,” Totté said.
“We now have a significantly enhanced vision of its potential,” he said.
Its strength has been in the specialist crafting sector in the UK, he said, but there is an “exciting opportunity” to broaden the focus of this business to a much wider consumer audience across the UK and the globe.
The firm said its vision is to develop the brand globally “as an expert in cake decorating”.
“We see the web as a major facilitator for this,” Totté said.
The golden performance amid the rest
RGFC has announced plans to develop an e-commerce channel to add to its Industrial, Consumer and Export segments to drive this growth vision.
Renshaw pulled in £46.3m (€57.6m) for the 15 month period with its 2011 revenues up 12.5% to £34.2m (€42.6m).
It is an “exceptionally seasonal business”, reliant on its strong trading profits in October to December, RGFC said, and solid domestic UK revenues but also strong exports to the US and Scandinavia.
Its Haydens bakery business reported lower revenues of £29.6m (€36.8m) with an EBITDA drop to a loss (£0.4m) in 2011 amid a “difficult year” due to significant material cost increases and later than planned factory development.
Despite this, its new distribution site in Hopton enabled increased investment and 30 new product launches were made throughout the year.
Napier Brown, the group’s sugar business, pulled in £176.8m (€220.2m) for the 15 month period with its 2011 annual figures up 32.6% on 2010.
It began sourcing sugar from seven new countries and plans to continue this ‘multi-sourcing’ initiative as a core business focus to ensure continued alternative supply options to the major EU beet sugar producers.
The firm announced that Omnicane, the biggest sugar producer in Mauritius, has taken a significant equity stake in the company.
Set for ambitious growth…
While Renshaw was highlighted as a key focus for RGFC, it has reiterated its commitment to doubling overall group sales over the next three years.
Totté hinted at the need to invest in increased capacity to do so, with “exciting challenges” on the horizon as it embarks on a period of transformation of scale.