When PV met SnackTime Chairman Jeremy Hamer, (pictured), the shareholder jury was out on the Versatel deal. Now, with the required investment approved and a team that’s itching for action, he can look forward to the future.
Jeremy Hamer does not look a pugilist from central casting, but he’s itching to get back into the ring, nevertheless. He’s come out fighting in recent months, demonstrating his determination to save a business that he believes in.,
But it’s the cut and thrust of vending that the company’s missed. It’s doing the big deals, introducing exciting innovation to the marketplace and maximizing the huge potential promised by automatic retailing. ‘It’s a difficult industry’, he admits, ‘and there’s over capacity in it. As I’ve said, we haven’t been able to compete with the Big Boys recently, but now that we soon will be able to, the UK marketplace will witness a new SnackTime.’
The company is to champion technology in a bid to offer customers the best buying experience that automatic retailing can offer. Smart retailing and other forms of consumer engagement will feature at the core of forthcoming sales proposals. We have recently started bringing M2M connectivity to some of our existing estate where technology allows.
Once again, SnackTime will be in a position to compete for those bigger deals that demand ‘free on loan’ business terms and the company is also keen to take advantage of the modern vending machine’s capability to feature live streamed HD video content.
‘To be in that marketplace, we have to be able to invest in modern equipment, on the understanding that we won’t see a return on our investment for a period. We haven’t had that luxury in recent times.’
Jeremy recognises the progress made by the UK’s more fleet-of-foot independents in recent years. ‘They’ve had far more agility than the traditional ‘nationals’’, Jeremy said. ‘Many of them have a predominantly geographical focus and I think that’s very sensible. We used to purport to be ‘number three in the country’ but I’d much prefer to be number one in a locality. That density of business introduces certain economies of scale. SnackTime doesn’t necessarily enjoy those advantages, but we’re strong in the north west of England; we’re strong around our Midlands base and we’re well placed for London.’
Finally, one last backward glance at the difficult summer of 2014: ‘Yes, our shares were suspended, but I’m not sure people realised that the grounds for suspension were purely technical’, Jeremy said. ‘A company’s shares have to be suspended if, for whatever reason, the accounts are not signed off within six months. The company may be doing well, but no signed-off accounts means suspension.’
In fact, the SnackTime accounts show profits up 72% on EBITDA.
‘We wanted a clean audit report, we needed to have visibility of bank facilities for the next twelve months and to achieve that, we have had to wait for this new investment. We thought we’d have been ‘all set’ by end of September – be that as it may. We expect trading in SnackTime shares to resume in the next few weeks, backed by a vastly improved balance sheet.
‘We’re very soon to be back in the game. This investment will open doors for us and put SnackTime in a different position to that which we’ve endured for a couple of years – in fact, since the Vendia deal. It’s been very tough. There are a few people out there who don’t want us to succeed, but there’s a lot of goodwill as well, especially from the bank. They’ve been very patient as we’ve gone through this process.’
So, there you have it. SnackTime is, to all intents and purposes, back in business and with a strengthening automatic retailing team, the eyes of the industry will surely be watchful of their progress…
*Read Part One of Planet Vending’s exclusive interview with Jeremy Hamer HERE
