Brakes wins £50m deal

Brakes has won a £50m, three-year deal with the contract catering group Host to supply its dry, chilled and frozen food.

Brakes will supply Host’s 75 contracted units in business and industry, healthcare and education from the end of January, as well as its in-house contract business in healthcare (a further 53 contracts) and the new 16-site, £3m turnover PGL holiday/adventure camps contract that started in November 2009.

Host has also negotiated a further deal nominating Brakes for fresh butchery, fish, greengrocery, bakery and dairy, but has introduced another supplier for fresh food giving unit managers the option to source locally based produce from supply group e-foods.

“Giving our unit managers the option of using fresh supplies from e-foods offers them an automatic cost comparison with Brakes,” commented Host managing director Jerry Brand. “It’s an unusual deal as most contractors will use several suppliers, whereas we’ve opted for just two. This means that while we’ve negotiated a favourable deal with Brakes, we have also introduced an element of competition between Brakes and e-foods on fresh produce, so our managers have the choice of buying locally or nationally and with whoever offers the best quality at the best price.

In addition to benefits for its customers, he said the deal also reduced the number of deliveries the units would receive, so lowering Host’s carbon footprint and food miles.”