Hilton Foods warns profit will be dented after slower than expected cost mitigation talks
Meat packer Hilton Foods warned its annual operating profit would take a hit after challenges passing on high inflationary costs in its seafood arm, causing shares to plunge.
In a trading update on Tuesday morning, the FTSE 250 firm admitted its profit would come in at a lower than anticipated sum following challenges in its UK seafood business, plus wider macro-economic challenges.
Hilton Foods said it had been working with retail partners to either mitigate or pass through “unprecedented inflationary costs” but this had taken place “at a slower pace than anticipated.”
Discussions with retail partners would continue for the rest of the year and into early 2023, the protein business said.
The company’s share price took a hit of almost 15 per cent in early trading on the London Stock Exchange on Tuesday morning.