Jobs to go at McBride’s Bradford operation
SITES at Bradford and Burnley appear to have borne the brunt of the restructuring exercise completed at household products company McBride.
The company, which this morning reported a 76% drop in pre-tax profits to £7.1m (2010: £29.6m) on flat sales of £812.4m in the year to June 30, confirmed that around 300 jobs are likely to be lost as a result of its decision to close its household liquids plant in Burnley as part of its ‘Refresh’ strategy.
McBride added: “In addition, following comprehensive cost saving reviews across all UK sites, a further 40 staff including operational staff at the Bradford site, and administrative and personnel staff at divisional headquarters, will be leaving the business.”
The company said the restructuring of its UK businesses had led to an exceptional charge of £9.2m being declared against profits. In total, exceptional charges hit £13.2m which included further redundancy payments in Italy and the writedown in value of certain assets.
McBride, which also has a major operational base at Middleton in north Manchester and a factory at Barrow in Furness, saw its net debt increase by 40% during the year to £83.7m. Net assets increased by £700,000 to £125.4m.
Chief executive Chris Bull argued that the firm had delivered a “robust sales performance in a very challenging environment”.
UK sales dropped by 3% to £310.7m and sales in western Europe fell 2% to £405.7m. However, sales in its central and eastern European operations increased by 18%, due partly to higher volumes but also as a result of its acquisition of Czech company Dermacol last year.
Mr Bull said: “In western Europe, private label share of our main categories has held up despite aggressive competition from branded competitors.
“We have delivered strong sales growth in central and eastern Europe, and we are making good progress in Asia.”
He said that raw material cost increases continued to impact on the business, and that it had not always been possible to recover costs in the weaker trading environment. However, he said the firm would exit markets which remain unprofitable.
He also said the firm remained “focused on growing shareholder value through the rigorous execution of the ‘Refresh’ strategy”.
“We believe that the actions we are taking will enable us to become more efficient and therefore better able to realise the future potential for Private Label.”
