BONITA SPRINGS, Fla., Nov. 17, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Innovative Food Holdings, Inc. (OTCQB: IVFH), a direct-to-chef and a direct-to-consumer platform that provides high-quality, unique specialty foods through e-commerce offerings and multichannel partnerships, today reported its financial results for the third quarter and first nine months of 2020.
“The third quarter represents the culmination of two years of integrating, planning, and investing in our e-commerce platform. During the quarter, we launched our new igourmet.com website, modernized our corporate website, transitioned to a new warehouse, and re-aligned our e-commerce structure. We were able to achieve record third quarter e-commerce sales as a result of strong customer demand, while undertaking significant structural changes throughout our organization to support our compelling growth dynamics and optimize our platform driven cost structure,” stated Sam Klepfish, CEO of Innovative Food Holdings.
“The COVID-19 crisis continues to affect our specialty foodservice business, which has had a material impact on total sales and overall profitability throughout 2020. We are working hard to support our foodservice customers during this period, but we continue to see challenging market conditions within our foodservice business.”
“While trends within our foodservice business remain difficult, we are focusing on driving top- and bottom-line growth through our e-commerce platform. This includes leveraging the marketing and customer acquisition experience of our team at Mouth, while also expanding new channel relationships and growing our e-commerce product lines. I am pleased with how our teams have responded and I am extremely excited by our enhanced position heading into the seasonally strong fourth quarter,” concluded Mr. Klepfish.
Record E-Commerce Activity
For the 2020 third quarter, e-commerce revenue increased over 165%, compared to the same period last year, to a third quarter record of $4.2 million. Year-to-date, e-commerce revenue has increased approximately 166% from $5.5 million to $14.5 million. IVFH had over 20,000 active e-commerce customers in the third quarter, which is an increase of over 150% from the same period last year. Mouth.com continued to experience particularly strong demand as third quarter sales at Mouth.com increased over 500%, driven in part by investments in digital marketing.
E-commerce Realignment
As part of IVFH’s ongoing e-commerce transformation, the experienced digital marketing team at Mouth.com is now managing the entire e-commerce front end of IVFH’s platform including igourmet.com, and the Company’s brand strategy and branding, marketing strategy and execution, content, and photography. igourmet’s best-in-class operating team and platform will now support the Company’s procurement, inventory management and tracking, warehousing and warehouse management, fulfillment, logistics and customer service capabilities. The team at Mouth is now focused on developing successful digital marketing strategies at igourmet.com for the 2020 holiday season, and both Mouth and igourmet.com are well positioned for strong consumer and corporate demand.
New igourmet.com Website Successfully Launched
The new igourmet.com website was launched in September 2020 and provides epicurean customers with direct access to over 5,000 specialty food and specialty grocery products. Igourmet.com was built from the ground up on Shopify’s e-commerce platform, which supports leading digital, data, and marketing capabilities, and provides users with an intuitive, user friendly, and visually pleasing online gastronomic experience. This is the first major relaunch and re-platform of igourmet.com since it was founded in 1997.
Transition to New Mountain Top, Pennsylvania Warehouse Complete
During the 2020 third quarter, IVFH opened its new warehouse in Mountain Top, Pennsylvania. The warehouse is located on approximately 15 acres and includes over 200,000 square feet of useable warehouse space, providing capacity for significant volume expansion at a minimal cost. The new facility features a modern and efficient layout and includes freezer and refrigeration space to support the Company’s entire product line. As part of our operational improvement and e-commerce initiatives, we have enhanced our warehouse management system, added new logistics technologies, and created new processes. We believe these efforts will increase operating efficiencies and enhance overall profitability in the coming quarters.
Financial Results
IVFH’s revenue were $11.2 million during the three months ended September 30, 2020, compared to $13.5 million for the three months ended September 30, 2019. E-commerce revenue increased over 165%, driven by the Company’s ability to increase customers, conversion and sales at its e-commerce properties and partially offset a 42% decline in specialty foodservice revenues. The decline in foodservice revenue was driven by the continued impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the Company’s foodservice customers. For the 2020 nine months ended September 30, 2020, total revenue was $36.5 million, compared to $40.3 million last year.
About Innovative Food Holdings, Inc.
Innovative Food Holdings, Inc. is a direct-to-chef and a direct-to-consumer platform providing over 7,000 of the highest quality, unique specialty food products directly to chefs and direct to consumers nationwide, through e-commerce offerings and multichannel partnerships. Our direct-to-consumer offerings includes www.igourmet.com and www.mouth.com.
Additional information is available at www.ivfh.com.
