Timeline shows 2 Sisters turbulent journey
The firm completed its £342M buyout of Northern Foods in 2011. The deal was soon followed by the acquisition of Brookes Avana from Premier Foods for £30M, a sale which included Brookes Avana’s RF Brookes and Avana Bakeries.
But it has not been plain sailing for 2 Sisters, as it has been forced to make deep job cuts.
Job cuts
Six months after acquiring Brookes Avana, 2SFG announced plans to cut 200 jobs at its RF Brookes production facility in Leicestershire.
Earlier this year, the loss of a contract to supply Marks & Spencer put 650 jobs at risk at the firm’s Avana Bakeries site in Newport, Wales.
Avana had to sell its Christmas pudding business for the Competition Commission to agree the acquisition of the Brookes Avana business from Premier Foods.
2SFG also announced plans to close its Solway Foods site in Corby – formerly owned by Northern Foods – putting 900 jobs at risk, this year. But the site lives on under the new ownership of Utopia Foods, which bought it and the Avana Bakeries factory in July this year.
In 2013, the firm bought Vion’s red meat and poultry business, along with 11 production sites and 6,000 staff.
However, less than a year after the deal, 2SFG announced plans to cut 200 jobs at former Vion sites in Kinross and Perth.
Since Utopia Foods took over Avana Bakeries, 390 job cuts have been proposed there, together with up to 412 at 2 Sisters' Gunstones bakery at Dronfield earlier this month.
Annual results
2SFG suffered a loss of £16M in its last set of annual results, covering the 52 weeks to July 27, 2013.
According to full-year accounts, filed with Companies House, it boosted annual sales from £778M to £855M.
However, it posted a pre-tax loss of £16M, a considerable worsening of figures compared with a pre-tax loss of £1.8M in the previous financial year.
In addition, while the company made an operating profit before exceptional items of £1.1M in the year to July 28, 2012, it posted operating losses of £12.4M in the following year.
Speculation has been rife for some time that the company had taken on too much with its high-profile acquisitions.
