What we know about the Roberts Bakery deals and what comes next

Roberts Bakery business and assets were sold for nearly £24m, a new report has revealed.

Documents filed to Companies House this week by administrators PwC offered up significant details on the deals for the first time.

This included that private investment firm BPO, owned by entrepreneur Ranjit Singh Boparan, agreed to pay £21.6m in a pre-pack deal for the business (see table below for breakdown). Creating a new company, Roberts Bakery 1887 Ltd – a reference to the year the Cheshire-based business was founded – the acquisition saved 433 jobs across the Winsford and Northwich sites.

BPO paid £10.8m on completion of the sale, with the remaining sum to be paid within nine months.

Warburtons, meanwhile, acquired the Ilkeston factory for £2.1m on 29 September outside of the administration process, according to the report. The sale resulted in 37 redundancies. Warburtons said the factory will provide it with further capacity to meet demand in a growing segment of the bakery market, increasing its production capacity for the likes of thins and pittas.

Debts

The report also details estimated outcomes for creditors. Employees are owed £2.2m while more than 300 suppliers have been left out of pocket to the tune of £15.5m. It’s anticipated that between 1% and 4% of money owed to unsecured creditors will be paid within a year.

Prior to administration, Roberts had 519 employees. A total of 433 transferred to BPO, but 86 were made redundant. These employees, according to the report, are expected to have claims for arrears of wages and/or holidays accrued and not paid, notice pay, and redundancy pay.

Wells Fargo, Roberts’ main lender, has already been repaid the £4.6m it was owed as a secured creditor from sale proceeds.

Verity Trustees, which operates the company’s defined benefit pension scheme, is estimated to be indebted by £14.2m-£15.6m. It is expected this will paid within nine to 12 months, and it is anticipated to recover around 89.1%-98% of the sum.

A timeline of troubles

Roberts had faced several challenges in the years leading up to its administration which had impacted its trading performance and financial stability.

The onset of the pandemic in 2020 led to significant operational disruption and a sharp decline in sales, particularly as the company’s core products are staple items which are heavily affected by changes in consumer preferences and supply chain interruptions.

Like others, the business was further challenged by the rapid increase in wheat flour prices due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, as well as sharp rises in energy costs, which both eroded margins in an already competitive market.

Things got even worse for Roberts in June 2023 when a major fire ripped through its Northwich site. Former MD Julia Banton previously said that the fire was “probably [in] the worst place it could have been”, meaning it wiped out much of the infrastructure and services of the site. With a contingency plan in place, a rebuild began.

However, the latest report reveals that the outsourcing or production to another bakery ‘led to quality issues and further loss of sales as customers turned to competitors’. The prolonged disruption ‘resulted in ongoing supply challenges and damaged the reputation for reliability’.

These operational setbacks were further compounded by ‘the burden of continued pension deficit contributions and increased overheads’ which placed a significant strain on Roberts’ cashflow. Margins in the bread division rose to historic levels in FY25, but operating margins were negative due to high distribution and overhead costs not being offset. Sales fell in the biscuits division, although this stabilised after the firm undertook its ‘most important operational overhaul in decades’, which saw biscuit production relocated to Winsford from September 2024. Gross margins improved but the trading position ‘remained challenging’.

To return the company to profitability and positive cash generation, management developed “the Turnaround Plan” which included a strategic restructure of the Northwich site, including making 250 people redundant, and closing and selling the loss-making Ilkeston site. The plan sought to stabilise trading, improve cash flow, and deliver a sustainable business model over a three-year period.

However, PwC, which was brought in on 9 July 2025, found that Roberts didn’t have the liquidity to implement the plan. An accelerated mergers and acquisitions (AMA) process began in September, and the report states that having received no offers for the company as a whole as a going concern, directors decided that administration was the only option later that month.

Biscuits division proves popular

During this period, five offers were received – four for the biscuits division on a pre-packaged sale basis and one for the Northwich site on a standalone basis. During the w/c 29 September 2025 when preparations were being made for the sale of the biscuits division to an unnamed buyer, BPO put an offer on the table for the majority of the business and assets, which was concluded on 14 October.