SCOTTISH pizza oven firm Ooni has cited the US as its biggest market as it reported explosive growth.
The firm, which claims to be the world’s number one pizza oven company, said in financial highlights to December 31, 2021 that turnover was up by 264 per cent to a record £208 million,from £57.2m in 2020.
The firm said the product has become a “global sensation”, selling its range of pizza ovens and accessories in over 90 countries worldwide.
It has continued to "redefine the outdoor cookware category" with new accessory and oven launches, including the award-winning Ooni Karu 16 multi-fuel pizza oven last year, which it says is the only domestic pizza oven certified by the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana (AVPN), the Italian industry body designed to protect the true Napoletana pizza worldwide.
Ooni said that as the appetite for making pizza continues to grow, it is set to continue expanding its range of products, with the first half of 2022 already seeing the launch of Ooni’s first range of groceries "bringing together the best authentic pizza ingredient brands in one place and providing consumers with a one-stop shop for all their pizza-making needs".
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Ooni was founded by husband-and-wife team Kristian Tapaninaho and Darina Garland in 2012 and has been uilding a reputation for bringing portable pizza ovens to back gardens all over the world.
The company said it leads a new category after it launched what it said is the world’s first portable pizza oven with the goal being to help people “make truly great pizza at home”.
Darina Garland, co-founder and co-chief executive, said: “The last year has seen explosive growth as we’ve connected with more and more people around the world who can now experience the joy of making amazing pizza at home.
“Our growth has enabled us to expand the talented Ooni team, with employee numbers increasing over 500% since January 2020. Today we have 313 people in our company. We’re very excited to have a super engaged team who always give world-class scores in terms of employee happiness."
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She added: "This, our culture and Ooni values is a huge focus for us. At Ooni, we’re passionate about making a difference, not only to families and people around the world who get to enjoy making pizza together, but by being a business with a strong sense of social purpose, donating 1% of annual global turnover to social and environmental causes.”
As well as its commitment to donating the 1% of global revenues to charitable causes, in 2021 it planted over 800,000 trees with the Eden Reforestation Projects in Madagascar.
Ooni’s pizza ovens, accessories and groceries are sold through its website but the company also has trusted retail partnerships with brands such as John Lewis & Partners and Lakeland in the UK and Williams Sonoma and Bloomingdale’s in the US, with the US being Ooni’s biggest customer base.
The business is headquartered in West Lothian, and now has offices in Austin, Texas, Shanghai, China and Bonn, Germany.
A JP Morgan review ranked Ooni among the UK's fastest-growing businesses led or majority owned by women, or those where at least 50% of the management team are female.
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