RHM

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RHM, know more fully as Rank Hovis McDougall was a United Kingdom food business until it's purchase by Premier Foods in March 2007. Prior to it's takeover, the company owned numerous brands, particularly flour where it's core business started, and consumer food products. It owned a number of leading brands including:

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[edit] History

The company dated back to the merger in 1962 of flour millers McDougall, owner of Hovis and Be-Ro, and Joseph Rank Ltd. Purchased by Tomkins plc, it was delisted form the London Stock Exchange for a period of 13 years until, under new management, the company was again listed on the LSE in July 2005. In March 2007, RHM plc ceased to exist as the entire share capital was bought over by rival Premier Foods

Joseph Rank, the founder of the company, began in the milling business in 1875 by renting a small windmill. He lost money at first and had to take a cotenancy at West's Holderness Corn Mill. But he was soon able to recoup his losses and set enough money aside to expand his business. At this time competition from American and Hungarian flour was an issue for English millers. Rank explored new milling methods to improve his competitive position against these foreign imports. In 1885 he built a mechanically driven flour mill in Hull. By using steel rollers instead of mill stones, the mill was able to produce an impressive six sacks of flour an hour, up from one and a half. In 1888 he built another steel-roller plant in Lincolnshire, and soon after still another even more modern plant. This new plant, equipped with the best technology available, produced 20 sacks of flour an hour and was considered one of the finest flour mills in the country.


At the turn of the century Great Britain was plagued by malnutrition. The poor often lived on little more than bread and tea, and infant mortality was high. In 1901 military recruitment standards had to be lowered to find enough men to enlist for the Boer War: the new minimum height for recruits was reduced to five feet. Since bread was the staple of the country, Joseph Rank was challenged to increase productivity. He installed a plant that produced 30 sacks of flour an hour, and then another plant with a 40-sack-an-hour capacity. He also set up agencies to distribute his flour in parts of England where it previously had not been sold. In May 1899 Joseph Rank Limited was incorporated, and Joseph Rank became governing director, which he remained until his death in 1943.


In 1902 Rank made his first trip to the United States to see the wheat fields of the Midwest, determined to understand and conquer his competitors. Soon after his trip abroad, the company built mills in London and Cardiff. In 1912 a mill in Birkenhead was built to supply the needs of Ireland and northwestern England. Soon after that, the corporate headquarters was moved from Yorkshire to London.


During World War I, when starvation was a real threat to the people of Great Britain, Joseph Rank was asked to become a member of the Wheat Control Board. Frustrated by the government's inability to warehouse large quantities of wheat--distribution became chaotic as many ships carrying supplies were sunk--he relied much on his own resources and initiative to buy and store quantities of wheat and to increase the production capacity of his London mill. During the war years, the company employed 3,000 workers, many of them women who took on production jobs while men were away fighting the war. Despite his philosophy of personal initiative, Rank and his sons were known for public service, religious faith, and philanthropic work. In 1935 Joseph Rank received the Freedom of the City of Hull (the only public honor he ever accepted), in part because of a trust fund he had set up in Hull to help "poor persons of good character."


During the 1920s, the milling capacity in Great Britain exceeded the demand for flour. Nevertheless, Joseph Rank was able to expand into Scotland and consolidate and expand his operations in Ireland. He perceived the potential of new methods of transportation and communication very early, forming the British Isles Transport Company Limited to provide for the distribution needs of his company in 1920. In 1933 Ranks Limited became a public corporation. By this time Joseph Rank was in his eighties, but he was still actively involved in the business. His son Rowland was running his own business--the Mark Mayhew mill, which produced animal feed as well as flour, and which, after World War II, would be incorporated into the Rank company. His son James, who after his father's death in 1943 became chairman of the company, was employed during the war as the government's director for cereal imports. Joseph Rank, despite his age, also contributed to the war effort by working as a secret wheat buyer for the government to build up stocks in the year before the outbreak of war.


After World War II, James Rank, the new chairman, was joined by an associate of his government-service days, Cecil Loombe, who became a director. Their challenge was to reconstruct the mills devastated by bombing and to expand the company. A new mill in Gateshead was their first big postwar accomplishment.


In 1952 James Rank was succeeded by his brother Arthur as chairman. Under Arthur Rank, the company explored many new ventures and began to acquire a variety of small, family-owned agriculture and baking businesses. It was also during this period that the company's faith in quality control and research was firmly established. High standards of nutrition were set and maintained for both human and animal foods by testing in every phase of the production process. The legacy of these early efforts is RHM Technology Limited and its research center at High Wycombe, staffed by more than 200 scientists who continue to improve the nutritional value of the company's products as well as look for new food sources.


In 1962, still under the leadership of Arthur Rank, Ranks Limited acquired the Hovis-McDougall Company and became Ranks Hovis McDougall, Limited (RHM). In 1968 RHM made another important acquisition: the Cerebos food group, which brought with it a number of popular food brands as well as interests in France, Argentina, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, the United States, and South Africa. By 1969, after transforming the company from a flour mill to an international company with a variety of food interests, Arthur Rank was ready to hand over the chairmanship to his brother's son, whose name, like his grandfather's, was Joseph Rank.


Under Joseph Rank's leadership the company maintained its dedication to research. During the 1970s, the research center at High Wycombe prospered and undertook projects in crustacea farming cereal and seed production, wheat hybrids, and protein production from starch. By 1984 research had advanced to the point that the company was ready to undertake a joint venture with ICI, Britain's largest industrial company, to form Marlow Foods, a company dedicated to producing and promoting mycoprotein food--food made by industrial fermentation of wheat-derived products and noted for being high in protein and fiber and low in fat, as well as containing no cholesterol.


By the late 1970s, RHM and its competitor, Associated British Foods PLC, monopolized their industry. Each company was selling over 60 percent of the flour it milled to its own subsidiaries, thereby offsetting losses in its baking division. Unable to compete or sustain losses, many small independent bakeries closed.


Joseph Rank became president in 1981 and was succeeded as chairman by Sir Peter Reynolds. The company made a number of important acquisitions during the 1980s in the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Far East. The largest acquisition was the 1987 purchase of U.K.-based Avana Group, which was renamed Avana Bakeries Limited. After a career with the company that had begun in 1936, Joseph Rank retired in 1988, remaining an honorary president after his retirement.


RHM undertook an unusual advertising campaign in 1986--one designed not for consumers of its products, but rather for the financial press, to increase awareness of the company itself. The ads featured a variety of slogans, all of which emphasized the diversity of the company, including "We do not live by bread alone" and "We bakers like to have fingers in many pies."


[edit] Group Organisation

Prior to takeover, the group was grouped into 3 divisions:- Bread Bakeries, Culinary Brands and Cakes & Customer Partnerships. Premier Foods is in the process of integrating Culinary Brands, Cakes and Customer Partnerships in to it's core business unit, although Bread Bakeries (including Rank Hovis milling) are to remain as a stand alone business unit for the time being, because of the different supply chain demands (high volume, short shelf life bread)

[edit] The Rank Name

A common misconception is that the 'Rank' in the name signifies an acquired business of the Rank Organisation. This is understandable as Rank themselves were at one point a highly diversified conglomerate, and were apt to renaming acquired or joint venture business by prefixing them with the name 'Rank'. i.e. Rank Xerox.

There is a link, but the 'Rank' reference is to Joseph Rank, father of J. Arthur Rank, who merely inherited the business upon his fathers death. It always remained a separately run enterprise.

[edit] External links

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