Gloucester Rugby's key corporate partner under the spotlight
When you're a sports fan it's amazing how important a businesses becomes if it sponsors your team! Which explains why Gloucester Rugby fans are interested in shelving and racking giant called BiGDUG.
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It’s been a month of extremes for Gloucester Rugby’s biggest corporate partner, which has seen it achieve everything from having a doughnut named after it (we kid you not) to revealing just how it’s faring financially too.
When the Kingsholm club reopened its newly purchased bar, The Heritage Bar, on Kingsholm Road, this month (July) it revealed a space that now accommodates the club shop (in collaboration with technical kit partner Macron) as well as coffee chain Guilt Trip.
And as part of the grand reveal that coffee chain, which also has a cafe at Gloucester Docks as well as in Cheltenham, proudly unveiled a surprise of its own - ‘THE BiGDUG’ doughnut, a ‘thank you’ to the club’s main sponsor.
As for BiGDUG, which took over from long-standing sponsor of Gloucester Rugby, Mitsubishi Motors, four years ago, as impressed as it surely must have been by the ever so sweet tribute from Guilt Trip, it had other things on its mind.
The Gloucester-headquartered business, an expert in storage solutions ranging from shelving and racking to workshop kit and flooring, was preparing to officially publish how well it had fared over the 12 months of its last full financial year.
It’s a performance it also suggests sets it up for bigger things to come.
BiGDUG’s latest annual results, for the year ending 31 December 2024 reveal turnover rose from £42.5 million in 2023 to £44.8 million in 2024.
“The company has seen stable turnover and profitability in 2024, reflecting the continued investment into stratgeic initiatives and giving a sound basis for growth,” said Christopher Reilly, managing director of the firm, whose name appears in bold on the shirts of both Gloucester Rugby’s men’s team and the all-conquering Gloucester Hartpury women’s team.
“As shown in the income statement the company’s turnover for 2024 has increased by over five per cent on the previous year, in line with expected growth and gross profit and increased by seven per cent due to a stronger product mix.
“Net profit margin has decreased from 4.74 per cent to 4.05 per cent.
“The company will continue to build on its strong foundations offering products via various online and offline channels.”
In January 2024 BiGDUG undertook a transfer (TUPE) of employees to the company from a sister business within the German-owned Takkt AG group, in addition to those it moved over in 2023.
Staff numbers increased from 165 in 2023 to 205 in 2024 as a result.
BiGDUG is part of The Raikes Journal’s Top 100 Businesses in Gloucestershire series, which sees it track the fortunes of the county’s biggest firms by turnover.
Those articles can all be found in our Reports & Deals channel, sponsored by accountants Randall & Payne.
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