Bakery goes Down Under as scones prove a hit

SCONES manufactured by a Yorkshire bakery are being exported to Australia as part of a growth drive by the business.

Barnsley-based Haywood & Padgett has started the export initiative after stepping up production and  investing more than £2m in new technology and buildings.

A £600,000 oven which will produce 50,000 scones an hour has been bought, thanks to support from Yorkshire Bank’s Doncaster Financial Solutions Centre (FSC) through the bank’s Investing for Growth initiative.

Haywood & Padgett, which makes 1m scones a day, has also started exporting to France, Portugal and Spain and plans to expand into the US and Asia as part of a growth strategy which will also see it extend its premises.

The company was founded in 1987 as a one-man business by managing director, Wayne Padgett, with just a rolling pin, pastry cutter, a food mixer, £5,000 of his own cash and a loan for the same amount from Yorkshire Bank.

Haywood & Padgett, which delivers daily to the major multiplies including Asda, Morrisons, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Iceland, ALDI and Lidl, has 120 staff and a £13m turnover.

Mr Padgett said: “The funding is helping us expand our current business and invest in new machinery. This will make us more efficient and double our production capacity so we can create more jobs for the local community.

“We believe that we are the world’s biggest scones manufacturer and our scones are being very well received in Australia.

“We are also working to increase our business with airports as we feel it is very British to have a scone with a cup of tea and the airlines are helping us to promote this.”

Yorkshire Bank Doncaster FSC managing partner, Neil Bradburne, said: “We’ve supported Haywood and Padgett from the very start. The business has stayed true to its original principles of high quality and value for money so is ideally placed to continue to expand and Yorkshire Bank is pleased to be supporting this business through our Investing for Growth initiative.”