Tanfield moving 'towards break-even' as sales rise 24%

Tanfield Group, owner of Snorkel, said revenues for the first half of 2011 were up 24% to €24.4 million, and that the company was moving "towards break-even".

Snorkel's order book now stands at £20.9 million, almost three times higher than six months ago.

In a trading update before it enters its closed period for the first half results, Tanfield said supply chain problems continued to constrain the speed of growth, with suppliers taking time to "re-balance and re-build lost capacity to cope with the returning demand". Tanfield said these constraints would continue for the rest of 2011.

Darren Kell, Tanfield's chief executive officer, said; "We continue to work closely with all of our suppliers to remove bottlenecks, so we can further increase production, meet the recovering market demand globally in our products, and reduce our lead times.

"We expect the wider market will continue to improve in the second half of 2011, as the company moves closer towards break-even."

The company did not provide details of the geographical split in sales in its trading statement.