Almost £30 million of lost sales in its potato operations cast a shadow over the first half results of grocery giant Premier Foods.
The lost retailer contracts and poor market prices for its subsidiary MBM Produce saw the company’s potato sales drop from £88.9m to £58.3m. Premier said it recently completed the £5.5m acquisition of Monument, a vegetable and potato supplier to help broaden its offer.
Despite this, like-for-like operating profit for the business in the six months to June 2, revealed a 5.4 per cent rise to £41.1m.
However, total turnover declined from £475.5m to £409.2m, reflecting the sale of the Materne business as part of Premier’s flotation last year.
On continuing business, turnover fell by 3.9 per cent from £425.8m to £409.3m, with the company laying the blame with it poor potato performance.
