Oliver Twist asked Mr Bumble (who oversaw ladling out the daily rations at the workhouse) for more gruel. “Please sir, can I have some more?”
Tiger Brands’ shareholders are seemingly like Oliver, but with less justification. Despite a startling turnaround strategy instigated by veteran food producer executive Tjaart Kruger — which has delivered asset sales, an uplift in earnings and juicy special dividends — the market still wants more.
For several years, the Kitty (as Tiger is known) had gotten a little flabby. Brand complacency and poor operational execution had caused slumping share price performance from 2017 to 2023. Its iconic grocery labels failed to gain resonance and traction in a tightening and competitive consumer environment. More nimble competitors were eating Kitty’s lunch with innovation, price and nimbleness. Tiger had simply lost its way.
Shareholders had had enough. Since Kruger was appointed CEO in November 2023, the share price has been on a tear, rising to a high of R380 or 125% higher, to its mid-January 2026 peak. Since Kruger’s appointment, R7.4bn has been repaid to shareholders: R5.8bn in total and special dividends and R1.6bn in share buybacks.
Repositioning Tiger’s brands has been Kruger’s mantra. The legendary brand portfolio was out of sync with price points consumers wanted to pay, with an internal belief that Tiger deserved a price premium. The production cost base needed trimming to bring about a value proposition leading to eventual meaningful volume growth.
This strategy was enhanced via sales of noncore businesses in baby wellbeing, canned fruit and offshore operations, with even iconic Beacon being put up for sale. These were all business basics that previous Tiger management had failed to implement, leading to years of underperformance.
Tiger has five business silos with culinary (Koo, All Gold, Black Cat and Crosse & Blackwell) the largest at 32%, or R5.66bn of sales. It is followed by Albany within milling and baking (24% or R4.2bn) and grains (Tastic, Jungle Oats) at 19% or R3.47bn. Snacks, treats and beverages make up a R3.27bn category, rounding up at 18% of sales. The smallest part is home and personal care at 7% or R1.3bn in sales, with the Doom pest control and Ingram’s skincare brands.
Kruger has certainly returned some roar to Tiger. Despite interim results to March 2026 showing a modest 0.6% rise in continuing headline earnings to 980c a share, investors need to consider the high interim base in 2025 — which benefited from the sale of the 24.38% stake in Chilean food and beverage manufacturer Empresas Carozzi for $240m (about R4.4bn), alongside the exit from baby wellbeing for R605m. Excluding these items, continuing headline earnings would have risen 24%. Tightening manufacturing, cutting costs and improving efficiencies saw gross margin rise 230bp to 32.1%.
In key categories there was impressive like-on-like improvement. From meagre volume growth, milling and baking saw a 15% increase in profits to R376m; grains rose 92% to R441m; with snacks, treats and beverages at R562m (+26%). However, with gains in the prior period of R1.57bn from asset sales and profit on a disposal that skewed the 2025 interim base, profit for the first half of 2026 fell 24% to R1.6bn.
The market wanted more, and year to date Tiger’s share price roar has become more of a meow, with the stock down 24% to R290 at the time of writing. But the results belie the material change that has occurred within Tiger, with many benefits yet to accrue. Despite low volume growth of 4.5%, gains in operational improvements were stellar alongside margin expansion.
Significant price deflation in grains (-11.4%) skewed results where volume growth rose 8.7%. Culinary was a standout, with total growth of 8.8% (2.6% from price and 6.2% from volume). Management has high expectations for the bread division with major capex in a new mega-bakery, the biggest new build in the southern hemisphere, which aims to slash costs and improve efficiencies when it comes on stream at the end of this year.
Despite share price weakness, the eye of the Tiger is firmly back on business improvement. Kruger is stressing the ongoing simplification of the portfolio — in essence, a return to product affordability and cost leadership alongside accelerating innovation and growth. The ongoing benefits will start to flow through into 2027 and likely put some purr (and profit) in the kitty.
Anthony Clark
