Profits rise again for McCain as it recovers from poor potato crop

Frozen foods giant McCain has seen pre-tax profits top £56m, a year on from its finances being impacted by a poor potato crop.

The Scarborough-based group this morning published its annual results to June 30 2018. It showed that pre-tax profits reached £56m in the period – a rise from £47m in 2017, when profits dropped due to poor potato quality.

Revenues also rose to £511m, up from £466m in the previous year.

In its latest filing to Companies House, McCain said: “The company operates in two distinct sectors of the UK food market: retail and foodservice. Sales volume strengthened across the company’s market sectors during the year.

“The company’s strategy is to maintain its brand leadership in frozen potato products, in both the retail and foodservice channels. Focus remains on product quality, innovation and category leadership.”

It added: “Last year’s results were impacted by potato quality issues which arose during storage periods, resulting in increased purchases of market-related potato volumes.”

It said it mitigated supply chain issues by contracting a proportion of supplies as far in advance as possible and by having multiple supply sources.