CrisTim, one of the largest charcuterie producers, controlled by businessman Radu Timis, estimates the turnover in RON of the meat product division to go up by 20% to 406 million RON (over 95 million euros) this year.
"We anticipate that numerous charcuterie producers will run out of cash over the coming months, which will lead to a repositioning of the market. This is why we estimate our turnover will grow by approximately 20% in RON compared with last year," said Radu Timis, the majority shareholder and chairman of the company.
CrisTim derived 92 million euros in turnover from its charcuterie business in 2008, an increase of 8% in euros compared with the previous year. According to ZF estimates, which take into account the growth pace estimated by CrisTim’s shareholder, the turnover on this segment will be close to 100 million euros at the end of this year.
Timis added that in January this year, CrisTim achieved a 10% increase in the volume of its sales compared with the same time in 2008, with an average of 82 tonnes of cold cuts sold every day. It also saw turnover rise by 25% compared with the same time of last year, the shareholder said.
"We expect to see average sales values to peak at 120 to 140 tonnes a day until the end of the year, approximately 30% higher than in 2008, when we sold 100 tonnes of charcuterie products a day," Timis said.
CrisTim is therefore one of the few players on the charcuterie market to have posted a sales increase in the first month of the year given that sales started to go down in the last quarter of 2008. In January, Caroli Foods registered a 3% decline in sales, while Elit Cugir’s sales were down 15%. Both producers are among the top five on the market.
"Consumption has decreased by approximately 10% across the entire market," CrisTim’s chairman says.
CrisTim made about 5% of the employees of the charcuterie division redundant, that is 100 people, in order to boost efficiency. It also halted about 8 million euros in investments planned for this year and, despite having initially considered acquisitions for 2009, postponed the plan for some time over the coming years.
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