All News articles – Page 765
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News
Macphie warns of tough 2008
Scottish ingredients supplier Macphie of Glenbervie has predicted a tough road ahead despite record profits last year.The company’s pre-tax profit for 2007 was up 12% to £3.8m and sales increased by 2%, according to accounts lodged with Companies House. However, chief executive, Alastair Macphie, forecast a much less cheerful ...
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Trend spotting 2008
In 2007 the baking industry saw a tumultuous year of unprecedented across-the-board ingredients price rises in everything from flour to eggs, the emergence of carbon labelling and the rapid rise of the Polish bread market. So what’s in store for this year? One thing that ain’t gonna happen is a ...
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British Bakels’ MD handed global role across group
British Bakels MD Paul Morrow has been promoted to the two-strong executive committee that runs the Bakels group worldwide.The group comprises 35 Bakels companies spread over five continents and 30 countries employing over 2,000 people.Morrow will continue to report to executive chairman Armin Ulrich, who is based in Switzerland, while ...
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Sainsbury’s five-point agenda
Bakery products must taste fantastic and be of great quality. That, perhaps unsurprisingly, is Sainsbury’s bakery buyer Sarah Mackenzie’s advice to potential bakery suppliers.But great products alone are no longer enough to get listed with the multiple. Suppliers must also fit in with Sainsbury’s corporate responsibility five-point plan. "We’re striving ...
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Asda removes artificial colours and flavours
Asda has cut artificial colours and flavours from all of its 9,000 own-label products.Asda’s bakery director Huw Edwards told British Baker that the initiative applies to all own-label bakery products including celebration cakes, in-store bakery lines and morning goods as of this month. He said that on-pack information would be ...
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Gordon Polson, director, Federation of Bakers
Health remained at the top of the agenda in 2007 and folic fortification was at the forefront of last year’s health debate.It looks like it will now be in 2008 when these plans will move forwards. The Federation of Bakers (FoB) recognises that if fortification of bread with folic acid ...
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Bakery Services sale goes through
Bakery Services has sold its two operating divisions, Inbake and Don Millers, to current directors Keith Bentley and David Drury for £50,000, after a shareholder meeting on 28 December.
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Big in retail
The year 2007 will be remembered as one of extraordinary change on the high street, as ’deskilled’ bakery formats such as Subway and Costa Coffee stormed the UK, trading in the same territory as the modern baker’s shop.Subway opened 240 franchises over the year and finished up with over 1,000 ...
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Briefs
n We enclose the British Baker 2008 yearplanner with this issue. Unfortunately there was a production error on the version sent out last year, please discard it. Apologies for the inconvenience.n Plant baker Warburtons has moved its East Midlands depot from Riddings to a new purpose-built site in nearby Langley ...
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Cake takeover
Greencore said it had diversified into alternative customer channels with the purchase of Taunton-based desserts group Ministry of Cake in December.Ministry of Cake, formerly Maynard Scotts, supplies foodservice companies with frozen cakes, cheesecakes and pastries.The company produces own-label under the Ministry of Cake brand with turnover of £16m. It was ...
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Carr’s warns of flour profit risks
Carr’s Milling Industries said last week that profitability in its flour business was "unsatisfactory" despite two price increases since August.In an interim management statement put out to coincide with its Annual General Meeting it said further price increases would be useful although these would be dictated by whether bakers were ...
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CSR watch
London bakeries keen to organise events highlighting sustainable business practices, such as organic or Fairtrade sourcing, are eligible for grants under a new scheme.Launched by the London Development Agency and London Food Link, the scheme has a total of £70,000 to distribute in small grants of £500 to £5,000."This is ...
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New Year fears
British Baker’s latest online poll suggests bakers are concerned that the skills shortage is the biggest issue facing the industry in 2008.So far, some 48% of respondents highlighted skills shortage as their biggest concern, with 24% saying their biggest worry was the rising cost of ingredients. Competition from larger rivals ...
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We must fight for survival
There are plenty of bakers in my home town of Bridport in Dorset, all well-established and apparently holding their own, although their turnover has been affected for the worse by the edge-of-town supermarket.Yet anecdotal evidence suggests the situation is less buoyant for bakers elsewhere in the UK. As a ...
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Greggs looks forward to reporting satisfactory year
Bakery chain Greggs this week reported a 5.6% increase in its like-for-like sales over the Christmas period, the four weeks to 5 January.In a trading update it also revealed that like-for-like sales increased 5.8% in the 28 weeks to 29 December, giving overall growth in like-for-like sales for the ...