The firm’s annual report revealed its net sales grew by €85m from €1.351.8m to €1.436.2m in 2017 compared to 2016, while EBIT rose by €9m.
Gaining a licence to export pork to China in May 2017 and introducing antibiotic-free chicken to the Finnish market in early autumn were among many factors contributing to the success of the business in 2017.
What is the Healthy Growth Strategy?
The Healthy Growth Strategy aims to retain and develop the two main objectives of the previous strategy period: improving profitability and strengthening the balance sheet.
Atria will put the strategy into practice by having each of the four business areas – Finland, Scandinavia. Russia and the Baltic – to implement its own development projects in seven focus areas. The purpose of the strategy is to address changes in the business environment and financial objectives.
The antibiotic-free chicken, launched under the Atria Family Farm brand on the Finnish market, helped grow sales in Finland by more than €50m, while Atria developed its marketing of pork in China strongly during the year, and the feedback received on both the products and Atria’s operations were positive.
“We achieved growth through the corporate acquisitions made earlier, but also organically,” said Atria CEO Juha Gröhn. “It is interesting that our sales under our own brands grew stronger, particularly in Finland and Estonia. Atria is a developer of strong brands, even though we also manufacture products for our customers’ brands.”
The company’s Healthy Growth strategy came as part of its organic growth, which was set up in 2016 and runs until 2020.
The firm also witnessed strong operating results in Russia through its renewed product lines, new sales channels and improvement of productivity, which Gröhn added was “noticeably different” five years ago.
“Previously, the majority of sales consisted of sales to a chained retail trade sector,” Gröhn added. “This has now been joined with other channels and customer groups. Sibylla’s success continues to be strong from one year to the next, and the number of sales outlets keeps on growing.”
Improving productivity through “cutting-edge technology” projects was also flagged up in the report, with the completed renovation of its Nurmo pig-cutting plant in late 2017 and its target to fully modernise its poultry plant in Sweden by the end of 2018.