Managing director Stephen Denbigh retired from the business last week, and finance director Rod Humby has also retired from the company after resigning as a director just before Christmas.
Both had been directors at the Leicester-based web offset printer for more than 20 years.
It’s not known if Denbigh and Humby will be directly replaced. Director Jonathan Sankey was unavailable for comment at the time of writing.
The family-owned business was founded in 1945 and will celebrate its 70th anniversary this year. It has a reputation for high quality printing and binding and prints for a raft of blue-chip clients including Marks & Spencer and John Lewis.
However, tough trading conditions in the highly-competitive web offset market impacted the firm’s latest results. In the year to 31 October 2013 sales fell 13% to £32.5m and the firm made a £2m impairment charge against the value of its fixed assets, which propelled its operating losses for the year to £4.6m (2012 operating loss: £608k).
Shareholders’ funds reduced from £11.3m to £3.2m due to the bottom-line loss of £3.8m and a dividend payment of £4.2m.
Although the company renegotiated its banking facilities with HSBC after the year-end, and increased its overdraft by £2m to £4.85m, auditors from BDO placed a going concern note on the accounts.
In the report, Artisan’s directors said they expected the company to post further losses in 2013/14, but predicted a return to profitability in the 2014/15 financial year now underway.
