Much loved tea brand on the brink of collapsing into administration
Typhoo Tea, one of the oldest tea companies in Britain, is close to going bust.
The century-old troubled tea brand has filed a notice to appoint administrators after recording losses of almost £40 million last year.
The brand is not yet in administration. Typhoo bosses filed a notice of intent (NOI) that gives them breathing space from creditors and seek a rescue deal, court documents filed yesterday show.
Dave McNulty, the newly appointed CEO of Typhoo, said the move enables the tea market titan to ‘to pursue a sale of the business’.
‘A further statement will be issued in due course with further information,’ he added.
Founded in 1903, Typhoo Tea has spent the past few years trying to bounce back from drooping sales.
Revenue shrank from £82 million in 2014/15 to £25,300,000 in 2022/23.
But trespassers damaging its former factory in Moreton, Merseyside, last year dealt a severe blow to the company’s bottom line.
Intruders occupied the site for several days and caused ‘extensive damage to its fabric and contents’, made some stock unusable and delayed the planned sale of the factory, Typhoo Tea said in August 2023.
All in all, the incident added costs of £24,000,000 to the already struggling manufacturer in the 2023 fiscal year.
Typhoo’s debts stood at £73,000,000 as of September 2023, up from £53,000,000 the year before.
Consumers, meanwhile, have increasingly ditched black tea – long a staple of many a British cupboard – for other hot drinks like herbal infusions.
Last year, 63% of people popped the kettle to make coffee compared to 99% doing so for tea, according to the 2023 Statista Global Consumer Survey.
Tea consumption has been falling since the mid-1970s as the ‘English Breakfast generation’, as consumer experts put them, made way for flat white-necking younger generations.
But tea isn’t vanishing off supermarket shelves anytime soon. In recent years, ‘wellness’ tea brands have been thriving as brands pop fruits, herbs and even mushrooms into their teabags.
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