The company, with revenue of EUR166 million in 2013 and over 2,800 employees, is the largest of Satu-Mare and the biggest Romanian-held producer in the food industry.
Unicarm’s store network is among the largest in Romanian retail and a true backbone for the EUR166 million business generated by the cold cuts, milk plants and bakeries owned by Lucut.
Vasile Lucut has gradually expanded the store network in Romania’s western and northern areas, several hundred kilometers away from Satu Mare, the location of Unicarm’s plants. The businessman’s ambitions became visible in recent years considering that six years ago he spoke of 30 stores and his network had reached 90 units last year.
“Investments in stores range between EUR200,000 and EUR500,000 per unit, but they may vary depending on whether the space is rented or not. We generally choose locations on apartment buildings’ ground floor,” says Lucut.
Unicarm’s aggressive retail expansion comes at a time when Romanian entrepreneurs have been stifled by international retail chains that opened almost 800 stores in the 2009-2013 period.
Whereas at the beginning foreign retailers expanded on large store formats, they have started tapping the segment of supermarkets and proximity stores in recent years, a segment controlled until that moment by Romanian entrepreneurs.
In this context, chains such as Oncos or Alba Market went insolvent, and other entrepreneurs put a brake on expansion or even sold spaces to foreign chains. Beside Unicarm, the largest Romanian-held networks that expanded further are Succes Nic Com of Nicolae Sarcina or Anabella of Mutu family of Valcea.
Unicarm managed last year to triple its net profit to EUR8.6 million, as 2013 was the most profitable year of the past seven years. The food producer managed to generate a 5% net profit margin, one of the highest in the food industry, after its revenue rose by 16%, to EUR166 million.
“The profit increase came as we did not invest so much last year, so that costs were lower”.
Vasile Lucut is a discreet businessman, with few press interviews, and is little known to people outside the FMCG industry. His name was also linked to some corruption scandals.
The entrepreneur says 2013 figures cannot be repeated this year as his company ended the first quarter of 2014 with falling revenue. “There were declines along all categories. The decline stood at 10%-15%, I have heard no entrepreneur speaking of increases at this year start,” says Unicarm head.
In 2013, Vasile Lucut operated one of the few investments independent of his business, earmarking EUR13 million for two photovoltaic parks with cumulated capacity of 9.5 MW.
(English version by Catalina Apostoiu)