Cumbrian Seafoods hailed top British company – Fishupdate.com
Cumbrian Seafoods hailed top British company Published: 19 October, 2010
CUMBRIAN Seafoods has been named as one of Britains leading mid-market companies.Established in Maryport, Cumbria by Peter Vassallo less than 15 years ago it has grown into a leading seafood suppliers to major retailers such as Tesco and Morrisons with annual sales of £164.3 million.
The list is produced by Fast Track, the countrys leading networking organisation focused on the top performing private businesses and entrepreneurs and supported by the HSBC Bank in association with the financial services company Grant Thornton. The list was published by the Sunday Times at the weekend.The report says that Cumbrian Seafoods, had profits of £3.8 million, according the last known accounts and a staff of 835 people. Cumbrian Seafoods opened a state-of-the-art seafood factory on the other side of the country at Seaham, County Durham a few years ago and has since carried out a major re-organisation of its manufacturing facilities.
The company product range includes everything from prawn cocktails to Thai crab. In the past year it has worked with Asda to launch a new range using king prawns from sustainable sources.
Just recently Cumbrian Seafoods unveiled a new initiative for fish welfare to ensure that Vietnamese fishing, which is growing in popularity, reaches the supermarket shelves in as human a way as possible. The company has joined forces with Tesco to develop a new process allowing the freshwater fish Pangasius, also known as River Cobbler or Basa, to be humanely stunned before processing. This joint initiative is believed to the first of its kind in the country. Cumbrian is also working closely with fish farms and factories in Vietnam as well as collaborating with GlobalGAP and the Global Aquaculture Alliance to ensure that their farming standards are adhered to by the suppliers.