All Latest News articles – Page 582
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News
Lion Capital invests in Hiestand
Lion Capital, a UK-based private equity firm, has agreed to acquire a 32% stake in Swiss bakery firm The Hiestand Group.Hiestand is an international provider of convenience deep-frozen bakery products in Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Poland, Malaysia, Japan and Turkey. Lion Capital is acquiring 170,000 shares of Hiestand."Hiestand is a leading ...
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Last chance for live contest
Bakers have a last chance to enter California Raisins’ live competition, which will be held at William Reed’s Baking Industry Exhibition (BIE) at the Birmingham NEC from 6-9 April 2008.The Future Baker Awards 2008 is open to bakery and confectionery students or trainees working towards a training programme.All teams must ...
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Pie plant may close
The future of a pie and pasty plant in the Midlands is in doubt following a downturn in trade.Management at the Apetito plant in Dudley has entered into a consultation process with staff. One of the options being considered is a closure of the plant where 80 people work.The management ...
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Maple Leaf UK rides out cost pressures
Canadian-owned Maple Leaf Foods has announced fourth-quarter results for 2007, which revealed an 11% increase in Bakery Product Group sales to $393m (£200m) up from $355m (£180m) in the last quarter of 2006.The group does not separate out the earnings of its UK divisions. In the past ...
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Pret A Manger deal to fuel overseas growth
Sandwich chain Pret A Manger has been taken over by private equity firm Bridgepoint in a deal valued at £345m, which will accelerate Pret’s expansion plans in the UK and internationally.Bridgepoint will buy the entire company, including the 33% stake acquired by McDonald’s in 2001, and will retain a majority ...
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Public happy to pay for Fairtrade
Research conducted by Café- direct found that almost nine out of 10 consumers said they would pay a few pence more for quality Fairtrade products.Out of 2,500 consumers that took part in the online survey at [http://www.bbcgoodfood.com], 87% of respondents bought Fairtrade every week or every month. Sales of Fairtrade ...
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Real Food Fest
Daylesford Organic will support the Real Food Festival in London from 24-27 April.The organic store is well known for its award-winning sourdough and produces a wide variety of cakes and biscuits.Carole Bamford of Daylesford Organic said: "We are delighted to be a partner in the Real Food Festival and to ...
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Health watch
Consumers are growing increasingly sceptical of health claims on food and drink packaging, according to a report from Datamonitor.But Michael Hughes, consumer market analyst and author of the study, said: "Current market conditions suggest the functional food market will continue to witness impressive growth rates in the future."The international market ...
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Oven training
Bakery oven supplier Rational has set up an academy for bakers to learn how to use its Self-Cooking Center."Our feedback suggests that many users of the SelfCooking Center use only a small proportion of its features," said Paul Anderson, sales director of Rational UK. "Bakers might have chosen it for ...
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Reporting in
Gundula Azeez, policy manager, The Soil AssociationGundula Azeez, policy manager, The Soil AssociationThe food chain contributes 18% of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions and agriculture makes up around half of this. Wheat production has a lower carbon footprint than the livestock sector, but milling, bread-making, packaging and retailing all produce ...
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viewpoint
The wheat market at the moment can best be described as volatile (pg 4). Prices in North America have shown sudden escalation - a consequence of low global wheat stocks coupled with an increase in speculative fund activity in soft commodity markets.Over the past two weeks high-quality wheats, such as ...
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Tate & Lyle reports profit lift amid challenging market
Sugar refiner Tate & Lyle has announced that for the four months to 31 January, profit before tax was "marginally ahead of expectations", despite issuing three profit warnings last year.A good performance in its Americas ingredients operations boosted the company’s results. It predicted that pre-tax profits in the six ...
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Key Note research reveals rising sales at top bakers
The average sales increase for the top 105 bakery companies was 18.9%, for the three years to December 7, 2006, according to a recently published report from Key Note."The sales growth rate shows an upward trend," said the report, "although the growth rate appeared to be slowing towards the ...
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West Sussex Bakery cleans up
Carl and Lorraine Edney, the owners of Splits bakeries, have taken over the former West Sussex Bakery in East Wittering. The couple are working hard to turn it into a thriving business again after former owner, Carl Boothby, was found guilty at Chichester Magistrates Court of seven hygiene offences, ...
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Briefs
n Ingredients supplier Mayfair Foods has acquired Hall Farm Merchants, a dried fruit business, with immediate effect. "We feel the acquisition of Hall Farm Merchants’ business fits the dynamics of Mayfair Foods," said a spokesperson for the company, who added that it was looking to make further acquisitions.n ...
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BSB takes conference to NEC
This spring’s British Society of Baking (BSB) Conference is at the Baking Industry Exhibition at the NEC, Birmingham. There is a gourmet dinner from 6.30pm on Monday, 7 April. Rooms can be booked at the Holiday Inn by the BSB.Tuesday registration is at 8.30am. Talks start at 9.20am, with the ...
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TV ’cake-off’
Lightbody Cakes, part of the Finsbury Food Group, is playing host to a BBC children’s show called Beat the Boss.In the show, a group of three children pitched their talent against three business professionals to come up with a new birthday cake for the children’s market. The two teams worked ...
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Competition Commission report gets mixed reception
After spending almost two years investigating the grocery sector, the Competition Commission published its latest report on February 15. This is an interim report, ahead of its final report which is due before May. Supermarkets and other interested parties will be lobbying hard between now and then.The Commission had earlier ...