Janet McCollum, Moy Park

Janet McCollum, Moy Park
Janet McCollum, CEO, Moy Park

When it comes to a leading business in Northern Ireland, they don’t come any bigger than Moy Park.

With a turnover of £1.5 billion in Europe, brand advertising as sponsor of the current World Cup finals and continuous growth, this is a company that is head and shoulders above any of the companies in the inaugural Neighbourhood Retailer Leaders in Grocery table.

The demand for locally sourced poultry is definitely helping to drive growth but Moy Park CEO Janet McCollum believes that the company’s long term success is down to its focus on continuous improvement and delivering high quality, good value products for customers and consumers.

Janet told NR: “We have continued to invest in the business, which has led to growth. Over the last decade we have invested almost £400 million on capital expenditure programmes making our processing facilities among the very best in Europe. In addition we have driven an investment programme on farms of some £400m in farming production capability.”

April 2013 brought about a major change to the business structure in NI when Moy Park’s parent company Marfrig gave it responsibility for the leadership and management of its operations in Europe. This was a significant development for the business, making Moy Park responsible for business turnover in Europe of around £1.5 billion.

Sustaining the level of growth Moy Park has achieved in the past few years will undoubtedly be a challenge but Janet is quick to point out that plans are well in place to build on the current success. “We have invested in category and consumer insight, innovation and food development, to add value to our products and ensure we focus on our customers and ultimately the consumer,” she explained.

“In October last year we launched a major grower expansion programme to meet this demand. The programme aims to increase breeder and broiler growing capacity by up to 400 poultry houses in Northern Ireland over the next 24 months.”

Moy Park Dungannon
Moy Park, Dungannon

A backdrop to this continued growth is the increase in production costs, which affects all food manufacturers. The volatility of feed and input costs remains a huge pressure for the industry.

Food is becoming more expensive to produce and Moy Park is working closely with its customers to recover costs from the market where it can.

Looking at the retail market, the Moy Park retail brand has been well received across the island of Ireland.

It’s the Republic of Ireland’s number one chicken brand and is well-established within the symbol sector and independent trade in Northern Ireland.

“We are always looking for ways to diversify and extend our Moy Park-branded product offering in Ireland,” said Janet.

“Our focus on food development continues to be centred on providing innovative products that offer consumers locally sourced, high quality chicken and turkey.”

With a consumer base in Northern Ireland that puts an increasing emphasis on food provenance and local produce, Moy Park has cemented its position as a company that is committed to providing fresh, locally sourced poultry and is ideally positioned to take advantage of this demand.

Janet added: “However, in this business we can never become complacent and we are always looking at market and consumer trends so we can drive innovation to meet changing consumer demands.”

After six months in the role of chief executive of Northern Ireland’s No.1 company, Janet says she is thoroughly enjoying her role.

“It is an exciting time to be in the food industry. Moy Park is a successful, thriving business made up of great people and we have big ambitions. I am very proud to be part of this business and look forward to what we can achieve over the coming years.”