Agroland, a Romanian entrepreneurial group present on the retail, agribusiness, food production and animal nutrition market, marked four years since the listing of Agroland Business System and Agroland Agribusiness on the AeRO market of the Bucharest Stock Exchange on Thursday, June 5. In this time, the company tripled its business and now plans to keep growing.
The company founded by Horia Cardoș, which started its activity in 1997, operates 240 stores specialized in selling garden, farm and pet products. It had a solid performance in the period 2021-2024, with turnover growth of over 62% for Agroland Business System and over 77% for Agroland Agribusiness, despite drought and price volatility in recent years.
“In these nearly 5 years, thanks to capital market investments, we managed to access over RON 50 million (EUR 10 million), of which RON 25 million through bonds and almost RON 30 million through capital increases. Without these resources, Agroland and the two listed companies wouldn’t be here. In these five years, we’ve tripled our business,” said Agroland founder Horia Cardoș.
In the next three years, the company plans to reach a consolidated group turnover of over EUR 100 million, to move to the main market, and to achieve an EBITDA of 10% of turnover.
Cardoș also said that the group wants to reach 300 Agroland-operated stores in the next 3 years, and that acquisitions are also on the table.
After the IPO in March 2021, Agroland reorganized its structure into Retail, Food, and Agribusiness, and began rebranding. Each division now has its own objectives, budgets and KPIs. The influx of capital allowed the capital to begin a long investment program, consolidating in the pet care, gardening, and egg markets.
Daniel Liciu, Deputy General Manager of Agroland Retail, stated that the company sees an annual growth of 20-30% in the pet care and gardening category. “We are heavily investing in opening stores in a new format, namely discounter for garden and animals. We see immense potential in the pet and garden area because people are increasingly connected to animals and gardening,” he added.
Andrei Pințur, CEO of Agroland Food, noted that the table egg market is dynamic and there is greater demand from new generations for healthy, traceable products. He stated that the group will be involved over the next 24 months in a new investment targeting the creation of an additional 500,000–600,000 laying hen housing units. “We have a goal to reach one million eggs produced per day within a maximum of 5 years,” he added.
Since listing, 52,421 transactions have been carried out with more than 34 million Agroland Business System shares, totaling more than RON 115 million (EUR 22.7 million). In the same period, 7,429 transactions were carried out with almost 1 million Agroland Agribusiness shares, totaling RON 18.4 million (EUR 3.5 million).
Moreover, Agroland Business Systems (AG) shares are now included in the BET AeRO AeRO index with a weight of almost 5%.
“Through this partnership, the Romanian capital market is once again demonstrating that it has the capacity to support entrepreneurial companies in various fields, in this case agribusiness, food production and animal nutrition, offering them financing solutions for their expansion plans. I congratulate the Agroland Group for their 4 years of presence on the capital market and wish them a prosperous future,” said Radu Hanga, President of the Bucharest Stock Exchange.
(Photo source: press release)
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