Isaac Fisher: the Pukka CEO with ‘orange optimism’

Pukka is on a mission to become “the number one business in savoury pastry”. So says newly appointed CEO Isaac Fisher, who took the reins in May. It’s a bold claim considering Pukka – the second-biggest savoury pastry brand in grocery, with value sales of £85m – is a fair distance away from Ginsters, whose sales exceed £130m.

But, speaking at Pukka’s Syston headquarters in Leicestershire, Fisher insists those ambitions are not pie in the sky. “I’m confident we can do it,” he says. “The business has been growing tremendously and has been hugely successful in recent years.”

Pukka is certainly making strong progress. It increased its value by almost a quarter last year (23.2%), on unit sales up 12.5% [NIQ 52 w/e 31 December 2023]. That put it ahead of Ginsters, whose volumes remained largely flat over the same period.

For Pukka, much of that success has been fuelled by strong, somewhat unusual NPD. “You’ve got to be brave,” Fisher argues. Rather than launching a Chicken Tikka pie, for instance, which “everyone’s already got”, Pukka’s innovations have spanned everything from Christmas Dinner and Pepperoni Pizza lines to All Day Breakfast and even Doner Kebab pies.

Pukka has also been unafraid to step outside its chilled pie heartland. In 2021, the brand launched a swathe of chilled handheld pastries – spanning slices, pasties and sausage rolls – into grocery, joined by frozen bakes and sausage rolls the following year.

“At Rotherham United, 50% of the attendants have a pie; there’d be absolute uproar if we didn’t sell in that stadium”

Frozen is a crucial part of Fisher’s strategy to knock pureplay chilled brand Ginsters off the top spot. “People fell in love with frozen again post-Covid, but savoury pastry is just not seeing that same transformation that pizza and ice cream have. I just think the fixture could be ranged so much better,” he says.

From twin-pack pies to four-packs and handheld pastries, “we really have got all the products you need to satisfy that frozen occasion, but I think there’s a job to do in retail to bring that to life”, Fisher says.

For Fisher, this innovative thinking is linked to Pukka’s family ownership. It’s an attribute that looked in doubt in March this year, when rumours circled around Pukka being bought by Ginsters owner Samworth Brothers – where Fisher worked as a buyer until 2013 – during a review period.

While Fisher keeps schtum on the details, he says the process made it “unequivocally clear” that the interests of the business would be best served by remaining under family ownership.

“We’re a tight team with strong family links and our value set is quite simple,” he says.

A family affair

That family element has been a constant for Pukka since it was founded by Trevor and Valerie Storer in 1963. Their sons, Tim and Andrew, are directors and remain actively involved in decision-making.

Fisher sees their involvement as a help. “The fact we’re privately owned and a single-site team means we can be more agile than other businesses,” he says. “We can turn ideas and NPD around very, very quickly.”

It has also helped forge a distinct brand identity, argues Fisher. “What’s different with Pukka compared to own-label and some of the other brands is the fun and personality we bring. It means it makes sense when we do something like Pepperoni Pizza pies.”

For Fisher, Pukka’s playful persona has its roots in the cheeky branded posters that used to adorn chip shops in the 1990s and 2000s. Some of the most memorable examples are proudly displayed at its HQ. One shows a bride and groom enjoying a Pukka pie wedding breakfast, another depicts pies as spaceships carrying out a “taste invasion” of London.

“We’re lucky the owners have always been brand-first,” says Fisher. “Tim, one of our owners, used to look after marketing in the early days, so they really understand that we need to invest in it.”

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This understanding has given Fisher and colleague Rachel Cranston – Pukka’s head of brand strategy – the opportunity to push through bold ideas. One of these was changing Pukka’s retail packs from black to orange in 2020 – as illustrated by a giant orange sign that illuminates where Fisher is sitting at HQ.

That “big decision” to move away from tradition has allowed Pukka to push its playful side – what Fisher refers to as its “orange optimism” – in the years since.

All of this is underpinned by Pukka’s core positioning as ‘the people’s pie’. In 2019, that concept was communicated through TV ads depicting what Pukka referred to as “everyday folk” eating its pastries.

Outside grocery, ‘the people’s pie’ has manifested itself in support for the people’s game. Football is a major focus for driving growth, Fisher says. “We’re in 35% of football clubs and are the leading pie brand in football by a long distance. We’ve got very clear plans to grow that to 50% in the next two to three years. And with that, there’s really good opportunity for us to put some really strong branding into the stadiums.”

This doesn’t have to be high spec, though. For example, Pukka simply gave Scarborough Athletic Football Club some money to paint their food shed orange. “We’ll do top division clubs right through to the lower leagues,” Fisher says.

In fact, supplying lower league teams is arguably even more important for Pukka, as “some of the big new stadiums that are built are trying to drive as much value into that eating occasion as they possibly can”.

“If you go to a Tottenham game, you can have mac & cheese, or you can have a poke bowl, or you can have a £15 burger.” By contrast, at Rotherham United, “50% of the attendants will always have a pie, so there’d be absolute uproar if we didn’t sell in that stadium.”

But, in the spirit of innovation, Pukka is now looking to sports and demographics outside of its heartland. Fisher wants to “take more sell in the rugby and cricket space” and improve its footprint in universities.

“Young people love the savoury pastries they buy from Greggs, they’ve already really bought into that savoury pastry occasion. So, I think we can offer something very similar by having a Pukka-branded point of sale [on campuses] to really bring it to life for people,” he says. “There’s no reason we can’t be playing across football, rugby, cricket and universities.”

One thing Fisher doesn’t want to shake up is Pukka’s current structure, in which grocery accounts for about 70% of the business. Fisher is keen to keep these proportions, but simply on a larger scale. “We just need to do it in quite a structured, methodical way.”

Of course, those ambitions will require Pukka to ramp up its production output. To this end, Pukka has invested £15m in its site and bakery facilities in the past five years and will continue to ensure its bakery is fit for future growth alongside developing “even more disruptive new products”.

But what could be more disruptive than a Doner Kebab pie? Fisher gives a sly grin as he delivers his parting shot: “Watch this space.”