Greencore grows foodservice

Greencore Group has unveiled ambitious plans to swell foodservice production to a fifth of its business, as well as revealing details of its environmental and nutrition strategies.

"We want 20% of our business to be in foodservice across all categories," said a company spokesman. The move is part of its drive to reduce sales to major retailers to less than half of its trading revenue within the next few years.

"As the multiple sector becomes more concentrated, the whole of our business doesn't want to be going to five customers," he said.

He denied that the main reason for the move was to counter increasing pressure on margins from supermarkets. "We're not doing this out of fear," he said. "It's just that as we grow, we have more choices."

Greencore also wanted to introduce more of its chilled food products into the foodservice sector, he added. "As caterers increasingly de-skill, we feel we can bring back food quality to the arena."

The company established a dedicated foodservice category last year, bringing in Neil Pinder, former head of Grampian Country Foods foodservice, to head up the new division.

Separately, group environmental manager James Cherry said that, rather than focusing on carbon labelling, the company saw mileage in increasing the efficiency of energy hungry processes, such as steam raising and refrigeration, at sites, such as its Selby factory. The company was also looking into using biofuel and reducing product packaging weight by 5%, said Cherry. "We're talking to the Waste Resources Action Programme to discuss signing the Courtauld commitment on cutting packaging waste."

Elsewhere, Greencore was ahead of schedule on reformulating products in response to official pressure, said group technical controller Greg Hunn. "We will hit the Food Standards Agency's targets for salt [of 1.1g per 100g of product] by 2008. We also have a strong project underway looking to eliminate transfats. We are also looking to offer healthy options in all product sectors."

He said Greencore's Food Bus, offering staff practical guidance on preparing healthy meals (Food Manufacture, August 2007, p10) was also helping to raise awareness of nutrition issues.