Filta Group’s environmental benefits to its customers has contributed to strong growth in the current year

Filta Group Holdings plc (LON:FLTA) has announced its ESG Commitment and a Trading Update.

Highlights

· Filta, through its proprietary FiltaFry process, helped US customers save over 9 million litres of cooking oil during 2020

· Cooking oil recycling during 2020 delivered CO2 reduction of 26,500 tonnes

· Second half trading for the Group has continued to be strong, posting record revenues for the third quarter and October, led by waste oil and equipment sales and installation

· The Group is confident of a positive finish to the trading year and anticipates full year revenue and adjusted EBITDA* will be slightly ahead of analyst forecasts

ESG Commitment and Environmental Impact Report 2020

For 25 years, Filta Group Holdings PLC, a provider of fryer management and other services to commercial kitchens, has been focussed on improving the environment and helping its customers operate more sustainably. All of the Group’s activities benefit the environment in many ways and the Board believes that it should provide its stakeholders with a clear statement of the Group’s ESG credentials and base year reporting metrics.

Filta is committed to achieving Net Zero Operational Impact on the environment across all its businesses by 2035. Equally important, Filta is also committed to helping its customers operate ever more sustainably and goes above and beyond this commitment by integrating sustainability into every customer-service delivery visit. To this end, Filta regularly provides Environmental Impact Reports to customers, a copy of which can be found in the ESG statement on the Company’s website.

Through its core service, FiltaFry, the regular cleaning of fryers and micro-filtration of the oil used in those fryers, Filta helped its US customers save 9.3 million litres of cooking oil during 2020. The EIR has calculated that producing this amount of cooking oil would normally emit over 5,000 tonnes of CO2 and has a carbon offset equivalent to planting 297,000 trees.

Although regular filtering can significantly extend the life of the oil, it does eventually need to be replaced. Filta provides collection and disposal services for the waste oil which is sold and converted into biodiesel. In 2020, 8.7 million litres of waste oil was collected by Filta and converted into biodiesel. Using this fuel instead of petroleum diesel generated a CO2 offset equivalent to planting more than 1.1 million trees.

The FiltaFry service is delivered through a network of franchisees who service over 7,000 kitchens every week through contracts with some of the world’s largest brands, including Sodexo, Compass, Aramark, Apex Companies, Whole Foods as well as restaurants, hospitals, supermarkets, universities and stadia.

The data detailed below are from the EIR which identifies the environmental savings Filta’s services achieved in 2020. This sets out a range of resource savings including water, agricultural land, fuel and also total CO2 reductions, which reached 26,500 tonnes.

Key environmental impacts identified:

Q3 2021 Trading Update

Filta is pleased to report that its continuing commitment to delivering environmental benefits to its customers has contributed to strong growth in the current year. In particular, volumes of waste oil collections have continued to grow and this, combined with higher oil prices, has helped to deliver revenues in Q3 2021 which are 10% higher than in 2019, the latest year unaffected by COVID-19, and 63% higher than Q3 of 2020.

The Company can also report that trading remained robust in October as revenues set a record monthly high. Accordingly, although the waste oil revenues command lower gross margins than our other activities, having regard to the continued robust trading that has been seen through October, the Board is expecting the out-turn for the year to produce adjusted EBITDA slightly ahead of analyst forecasts.

Filta’s CEO, Jason Sayers, commented : “We have always been very conscious of the need to look after our environment and these latest statistics have measured in detail the significant reductions in waste and emissions linked to us and our customers. Whilst good progress is being made, there is still much to be done to help our customers reduce their impact further and achieve Filta’s goal of being net zero carbon by 2035.”

“We are delighted that the efforts that we made to support our customers through the worst times of the pandemic are now being rewarded by improving activity levels, underpinned by customer loyalty, and that we can look to the future with a confidence that was difficult to imagine 12 months ago.”

Apex Companies, customer of Filta Group, commented: “Filta provides us with used fryer oil management for approximately 25-30 facilities for which we currently provide water and environmental consulting services.  They assist us in reducing the amount of waste oil disposed at these facilities by filtering the used fryer oil until it is no longer reusable, at which point it is taken offsite for conversion to biodiesel. Filta’s involvement with our program has reduced the amount of waste generated by these facilities and has also limited the potential for spills by eliminating the need for used cooking oil drums by removing oil directly from fryers at a number of the facilities.  Filta provides Environmental Impact Reports (EIRs) that summarize the quantity of oil conserved from the filtering process as well as the amount of oil hauled off-site for conversion to biodiesel. The EIRs also outline how the filtering and recycling process relate to resource management, energy management, and the reduction of pollutants emitted to the environment. These reports are greatly appreciated by our clients, as they demonstrate a commitment to increase sustainability at their facilities.”

*Adjusted EBITDA is earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortisation and share-based payment expense and non-recurring items.