A bird food manufacturer doubled pre-tax profits after a harsh winter in 2014 helped boost sales.

Unipet, which makes white label wild bird food as well as its Suet To Go and Hentastic brands, increased turnover by 21% to £10.8 million, a figure it said was “way ahead of industry standards”.

Pre-tax profits reached £1.7 million at the Sittingbourne company, according to its latest accounts filed to Companies House covering the 12 months to the end of November.

In his report, director Andrew Ball said: “A harsher winter enabled sales to remain strong in the early part of the financial year and on the back of that the company achieved new customer growth and continued development of new product lines.”

The firm, which also has sites in the Netherlands, US and Hong Kong, invested £677,000 in machinery.

Mr Ball said: “The continued aim is to enable the company to achieve greater turnover with minimal additional overheads and to allow the company to easily scale production according to both seasonal trends and also unexpected peaks and troughs in demand from its customers.”

He added the firm “intends to continue to market its Suet to Go brand and to maintain its market position within an increasingly competitive market.”