Profits plunge at food group

Ranjit Boparan (Credit: Parliament TV)

Food group Boparan, which found its 2 Sisters business at the centre of a food hygiene scandal late last year, has seen profits drop by three-quarters in its most recent quarter.

It has also revealed the departure of its group finance director Richard Pike after it made changes to the finance function, splitting responsibility for core financial work and M&A project activity into two separate roles.

Boparan’s like-for-like operating profit was down 78% to £3.1m in the 13 weeks to April 28. Like-for-like sales had edged up 1.3% to £836.7m in the same period.

Ranjit Singh, who stepped up to the role of president of Boparan Holdings earlier this year, said: “During the third quarter we delivered performance in line with our expectations. We have also strengthened our balance sheet considerably with the disposal of the Goodfella’s pizza business.

“We are making good progress with our Change programme as we refocus on our core strengths.”

The group appointed Ronald Kers as chief executive, who joined the business on June 1.

One of his immediate challenges is to improve the performance of Boparan’s protein division, which recorded a £5.8m operating loss in the quarter.

The company said: “The year-on-year volume growth has been more than offset by the negative impact of beef, poultry and fish price inflation, resulting in the disappointing underlying performance in the quarter.”

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