Highlights and key figures in 2022 looking ahead to 2023

Consolidated results in 2022

12% sales growth

The UEBITDA is under pressure due to high infl ation and the delayed charging of costs

Investment in start-up Davai (plant-based dumplings)

Solid net cash flow per share

Focus on long-term sustainable and profitable growth

Highlights and key figures

Our strengths and key events

2022 was a challenging year. Raw materials were less readily available and high infl ation put pressure on the purchasing power. Despite these difficult market conditions, the group succeeded in increasing its consolidated turnover by 12 percent (from 697 million to 781 million euros) following our responsible charging of price increases in the second half of last year.

The EBITDA shows a gradual recovery of the results for ready meals in the second half of 2022, thanks to our responsible charging of price increases and improved operating results.

Results for savoury slices & spreads fell slightly in the second half of 2022, mainly due to high infl ation and a decrease in demand. The non-underlying costs (2.3 million euros in 2022) in the current financial year consist entirely of costs related to the intention of acquiring Imperial-Stegeman. We are still awaiting approval from the Belgian and Dutch competition authorities for this merger. Should there be any further updates in respect of this transaction, the Group will communicate on this via a separate press release.

In the previous financial year, the non-underlying costs at the end of the fiscal year amounted to 6.9 million euros, which is significantly higher. The sum consists of costs related to, among other things, the sale of the reinsurance company in Luxembourg and the change of CEO as well as the Imperial-Stegeman transaction related expenses.

The war in Ukraine, rising energy prices and extreme weather conditions in much of Europe made some of our main ingredients less available: tomatoes, among other things, became scarce and durum wheat (for our pasta) became much more expensive. What’s Cooking? believes it is important to sustainably incorporate those cost increases within the chain, and to limit price changes for consumers as much as possible.

To incorporate infl ation and defl ation in a timely and correct manner, we entered into limited-term contracts with new clients or used automatic indexation mechanisms for the main commodities, where possible.

The war in Ukraine had little direct impact on What’s Cooking? because we barely buy and sell directly from and to Ukraine or Russia. When the conflict started, we immediately put our expansion plans to Russia on hold though.

Evidently, we have felt an indirect impact of the war in the form of rising energy costs and infl ation, which made the prices of our ingredients and packaging more expensive.

Savoury strategic business unit

Our new strategy focuses on a broader range of products. In this context, we renamed our former meat division “savoury”. The new name better reflects the extensive range in which the group wants to invest further. Hybrid (meat and vegetables), vegetarian and plant-based products will gradually become more important.

The turnover of the business unit rose by five percent (from 422.9 million to 442.5 million euros), mainly due to the delayed charging of cost increases. Sales within this business unit declined, mostly because of the drop in consumption and a number of expiring contracts. As already mentioned, complete charging happened with some delay following the first half of the year.

These situations combined caused the EBITDA of this segment to decrease by 27 percent (from 28.9 million euros in 2021 to 21.0 million euros in 2022).

Net financial debts further decreased by 6 million (from 73.8 million to 67.8 million euros).

Impact of inflation – war in Ukraine – energy

As expected, infl ation had a major impact on our results in both the first and second half of 2022. The cost price of animal products rose as a result of high feed and energy prices, bird flu, and outbreaks of African swine flu. Beef, pork and poultry, as well as derivative products such as milk and cheese, became more expensive. In addition, we saw strong price increases for some main ingredients of our ready meals. Finally, energy costs had an effect on the prices of our packaging as well.

The intended acquisition of Imperial - Stegeman will be an accelerator to the sale of branded products, snacks, hybrid & vegetarian products in this segment. At the end of 2022, the transaction was still pending approval by the Dutch and Belgian competition authorities. As soon as there is more news around this transaction, the group will communicate about this via a separate press release.