Blue Power considers product changes as high import duties bite




Blue Power Group, for the six-month period ended October 31, 2024, achieved revenues of $469 million and shareholder profits of $87.1 million.  This reflected a 16 per cent increase in revenues and a 23 per cent increase in profits over the same period in the prior year.


Blue Power Group (BP) supplies the Jamaican market for laundry soap and a range of bath soaps including medicated soaps, antibacterial soaps, beauty soaps and natural soaps that include local ingredients and locally made formulations that support skin health.


Chairman Jeffery Hall in the period’s financials said the company has plans to grow based on “innovation, quality systems and export customer development”, noting, “The Blue Power balance sheet, investment portfolio and liquidity also remain strong.”


BP aimed, he stated, to expand plant. “We also hold land that is adjacent to our core operations and that can accommodate the expansion of our plant over time, and the development of commercial buildings that can contribute in due course to our rental and investment income.”


He said that while the Group continued to be optimistic about the growth prospects business in Jamaica, as well as the opportunity to develop in select new markets BP was experiencing constraints from high import duties on the main raw materials used in the business and “the further application of duties on the finished product shipped to CARICOM markets.”


Alternatives are being considered. Hall stated, “We are therefore also exploring alternative production systems and product lines that are more suited to the trade regime as well as measures to diversify the business through opportunistic investments in related personal care products.”


Chairman Jefferey Hall commented that, nevertheless, BP during the period delivered on “our continued commitment to improve customer engagement, product development and operating efficiency while maintaining our steady growth in revenues.

“In addition to enhanced plant and labour productivity, Blue Power improved its supply chain management and procurement. These adjustments were critical to our program of maintaining the ongoing competitiveness of our core product lines.”

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