1. Home
2. News

Strategic shift at Enotria & Coe pays dividend

Sales grew 23% in the first half of 2019 and 26% in the second half of 2018, it said, with projected turnover for 2019 £200m, up from £172m last year.

The growth follows a renewed strategic focus at the company towards the premium on-trade.

Jon Pepper, chief operating officer at Enotria & Coe, said: “We’ve broadened out our national account business to encompass premium hotel groups and premium restaurant groups.

“The breadth and quality of our portfolio and our ability to tailor our offering allows us to work closely with those sorts of customers to drive their business forward.”

Key drivers for Enotria & Coe’s portfolio included by-the-glass serves, gin and French wines, he added.

“We’re seeing real growth in premium by-the-glass offerings – wines that our customers can sell at £10 to £15 by the glass – where we can offer interesting regional or indigenous options from a swathe of really top producers.

“The breadth and quality of our gin portfolio is second to none. We can talk to national customers who have outlets across the country and we can then offer a bespoke range for each individual outlet so each of these outlets has a local regional gin range which is really important.

“And then we’ve had a real focus on building the French portfolio over the last 12 to 18 months. We’ve had a number of names come in like Lurton and Cazes and so on to really drive it.”

The company has seen particular growth in the independent on-trade, picking up some 800 new customers in the last twelve months, it said.

The high customer growth rate is down to a combination of flexibility, customer service and the breadth and depth of the portfolio, said Pepper.

“We have a really broad portfolio and it’s increasingly important from a customer perspective to have the flexibility to order across any of that – single bottles, mixed cases, whatever they require – with next day delivery. It’s a real game-changer for customers.

“We own our own supply chain, we deliver on our own vehicles. We have a really high standard of customer service which is absolutely crucial for us.”

New customers include The Allbright, Arros, The Standard Hotel and The Curtain Hotel in London.

Enotria & Coe is confident that it is well placed to continue its strong performance.

“Growth seems to be quite consistent. We’re on track to deliver a really strong 2019 and we have quite ambitious growth plans for 2020 and beyond. We don’t see any slow down, to be honest,” Pepper said.

• wine
• Enotria & Coe