Profits double for Foyle Food Group in 2019

Northern Ireland-based meat processor Foyle Food Group reported a very strong performance for its 2019 financial year with pre-tax profits more than doubling last year.

Accounts recently filed with the companies office show Foyle Food Group made pre-tax profits of just under £5.2m (€5.8m) in 2019, which is more than double (+101%) the level of pre-tax profits the company made a year previous.

Foyle’s operating profits surged by almost two-thirds (+63%) last year to hit £6.9m (€7.8m), as operating profit margins widened from 1.2% in 2019 to a healthier 1.9% last year. Turnover for the year grew by 3% to just under £371m (€414m). According to the accounts, the net assets of Foyle Food Group are valued at just under £28m (€31m).

The Foyle Food Group began as a single abattoir in Lisahally on the outskirts of Derry city and has progressively grown through rebuilding and adding processing capacity along with acquisitions. The first acquisition was the ABP factory in Carrigans, Co Donegal, followed by Omagh Meats, Co Tyrone, with two abattoirs in England (Melton Mowbray and Gloucester) being acquired in the past decade.

The company also operates a rendering business, Foyle Proteins, which handles all waste and byproducts from the beef processing plants and includes further processing capability including retail packing. The most recent addition by the Foyle Food Group was a burger-manufacturing facility in Omagh, which supplies burger patties to Burger King.

Foyle is privately owned by the second generation of the Acheson family.

Business profile

The nature of Foyle’s business is focused on retail, with its four factories in Northern Ireland and Britain approved to supply the major supermarkets.

The company’s factory in Donegal has been among the first Irish beef plants to do business in the US and China when access was secured to these markets.

Foyle Donegal regularly features prominently in the Irish Farmers Journal price leagues, particularly after the company modified its payment grid to include a bonus for cattle that were eligible for the Chinese market.

Foyle is privately-owned by the second generation of the Acheson family, who took full ownership of the business following the buy-out of the previous co-owners, the Watson family.

The company is the largest beef processing group on the island of Ireland that consistently publishes annual accounts and provides visibility of the profitability of beef processing.

Brexit exposure

In theory, with the UK being just about 80% self-sufficient in beef supply, any business in the UK should have a readymade “home” market irrespective of what future trading relationship the UK has with the EU.

Four of Foyle’s five abattoirs are UK-based with Red Tractor approval. However, where there is a degree of uncertainty for Northern Ireland-based processors is how the Irish protocol, which is designed to maintain seamless cross-border trade on the island of Ireland, will affect processing of cattle and carcase beef coming from Britain into Northern Ireland for further processing.

Foyle, like a number of other Northern Irish factories, regularly sources beef carcases for deboning and further processing from Britain before selling the cuts with back into Britain or EU markets.

When the UK was still a member of the EU, this trade was seamless. However, with the UK soon to be outside the single market, albeit with a special arrangement to allow Northern Ireland’s continued participation, it is unclear at this point how business would continue.