The UK processor New England Seafood International (NESI) saw its renewed focus on retail pay off in the second half of 2019, as it plans to further grow its retail offering in the year ahead, its full-year accounts show.

Last year, NESI launched full whitefish ranges at Asda and The Co-operative Group from January 2019 and May 2019 respectively; and has plans to invest further into a wider range of species intended for retail. Although no mention is made in the accounts, the company has missed out on big chunks of Asda salmon and J. Sainsbury whitefish business, according to Undercurrent News sources. However, more recently, NESI has won some cod and haddock supply into Aldi and also launched its Leap brand in Tesco. 

Regarding the accounts, CEO Dan Aherne told Undercurrent that although the company had endured a challenging first quarter to the financial year ended Oct. 31 as a result of lower promotional retail volumes, NESI had "recovered volumes, won new business and drove efficiency and good cost control at both sites". Aherne did not comment on specific customers. 

“I was pleased with the hard-earned progress that the group made in 2019. After a big market reset at the start of the year, with a number of our retail customers making substantial changes to their promotional strategies, NESI, like many food suppliers had to adapt its offer," Aherne told Undercurrent. "We made good progress during the second half-year as the changes took effect and as we introduced new volume to our sites."

In total, when excluding the turnover of the now divested Grimsby foodservice business (below), annual sales increased by 7.2% to £148 million, despite falling behind year-on-year during the first quarter. Like-for-like operating profits were also up marginally from £5.42m to £5.48m y-o-y [...]