Princes continues campaign to sell Fray Bentos

By Anne Bruce

- Last updated on GMT

Related tags Fray bentos Premier foods

No sale in the can yet for the Fray Bentos brand
No sale in the can yet for the Fray Bentos brand
Food and drink group, Princes is continuing its efforts to sell the Fray Bentos canned meat business, which it bought from Premier Foods.

Premier agreed to sell its canned grocery operations to Princes​ for £182M in early February, including brands Crosse & Blackwell, Smedley’s and Fray Bentos.

Competition concerns

But the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) warned of “competition concerns​” regarding UK canned pie supply​. That lead Princes to agree to divest Fray Bentos and its manufacturing assets to avoid a referral to the Competition Commission.

Princes said it would run Fray Bentos independently of the rest of its business until a buyer was found.

But despite putting Fray Bentos on the market since the deal was completed on August 3, no buyer has been identified.

A Princes spokesman told FoodManufacture.co.uk: “The company would not want to talk about the process even if there had been any interest from a potential buyer​.”

Julian Wild, Food Group Director at Rollits, commented: “There are fewer deals and fewer buyers about, buyers are being much more selective. With Fray Bentos, when was the last time you bought canned meat?

Armed forces

“The business might be attractive to export companies or the armed forces, but Princes can’t seem to offload it at the moment​.”

Princes’ acquisition included two major UK canning sites at Long Sutton and Wisbech in East Anglia, employing 1,000 people.

Some of Premier Foods’ brands, including Branston and Batchelors, remain under Premier Foods’ ownership but have been licensed to Princes on a long-term arrangement.

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