County Durham white goods business Pacifica Group has bounced back to profit to trigger investment in staff and training.
The Houghton-le-Spring home appliance repair specialist has published accounts for the year ending March 31 2022, showing a turnover increase of 18% to £61.4m, and total profit for the year of £17.6m, a return to profit from the previous year’s loss of £1m. The prior year’s operating loss of £841,932 was also converted to profit of £17.6m.
The growth allowed it to expand by adding over 100 staff member across its operations, while also investing more than £1.5m in an engineer trainee programme. Directors said the year’s strong performance builds on the momentum generated in the previous year; growing its UK market share and gaining customers from key competitors.
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The company repairs over 350,000 home appliances every year and also has over 320,000 warranty customers with policies in force. Pacifica Group also invested more than £1m in IT development over the period, to support the business in its next phase of growth, while also strengthening the management team in key areas. Growth was aided two strategic acquisitions made in the previous year, as well as further acquisition in the current year.
The financial year saw the disposal of Pacifica Home Services (PHS), through a management buyout with share capital acquired by Viessmann and the existing management team.
Kevin Brown, chief executive of Pacifica Group, said there was a strong pipeline of acquisitions at the year-end, positioning the group well for more deals. And despite the current economical climate, Mr Brown said Pacifica Group is well positioned to deliver strong improvements in profitability in financial year 2023.
He said: “Pacifica Group has shown incredible strength and agility following the pandemic and during the current cost of living crisis. By putting our customers and colleagues first we have built a stronger business. I’d like to say a huge thank you to the entire team for rising so selflessly to every challenge they’ve faced. Their efforts have been truly heroic.
“Our continued investment in our trainee programme means we have a growing and highly skilled workforce to meet the increased demand we are seeing. This demand is in no small part down to the change in legislation that means there is now a full right to repair an appliance. The continued investment in IT has resulted in overhead savings and operational efficiencies which are being fully realised through the 2023 financial year, this has resulted in the business reporting significant improvements in profitability during the current financial year.
“Sustainability now forms an integral part of our business strategy and increasing our efforts to reach net zero. The business has now been certified as Carbon Neutral, making us the first in the sector to achieve this milestone, and we have published a detailed plan to become operationally net zero by 2035.”
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