Advertorial: Small and mighty

How Portion Solutions is helping brands unlock huge potential in foodservice

When Crucials burst onto the sauce scene in 2001, it had one mission: to banish the bland. With its range of 11 bottled sauces created for snacking occasions and contemporary meals, Crucials traded on its reputation for greattasting sauces at affordable prices. This proved to be a winning strategy as within four years, the range was stocked by more than 20,000 foodservice stockists.

Roll on to 2025, and the Crucials sauce range has expanded to reflect evolving consumer taste, becoming the number-one sauce brand across takeaways and food vans. It has also become a major grocery player with national distribution and listings in the major supermarkets. So what next for the brand’s growth?

Enter Portion Solutions, who suggested, intriguingly, that the answer wasn’t to go bigger, but smaller. Wes Armstrong, Commercial Director, Portion Solutions explains: “With bestselling ranges in grocery and a huge fan base in foodservice, the next step for Crucials was to reach new audiences and new foodservice settings, so the obvious answer was to create a portions range.

He continued: “The brand has such a loyal customer following and high repeat purchase rate, so bringing their big, bold flavours to a portions range made complete sense.”

And the bright ideas didn’t stop there. “While their flavours deliver stand-out taste, we wanted Crucials to have an even stronger point of difference so we made the packs 20% bigger than competitor brands.

“The larger packs appeal to consumers, while foodservice outlets could see the benefits, including reducing the number of packs consumed which lowered their costs, while also reducing plastic use. It’s the ultimate win-win.”

PORTION SOLUTIONS

If you’ve enjoyed a hot drink at an airport, a sachet of sauce at a takeaway or a tiny pot of jam with your hotel breakfast, chances are you’ll have sampled one of Portion Solutions’ products.

Supplying more than 400 different products to a vast array of outlets from bars and restaurants, coffee shops and cafes to leisure and wellbeing venues, healthcare and business settings, Portion Solutions is the UK’s leading portioning company. From convenience breakfast goods to contemporary and classic condiments, Portion Solutions manufactures and delivers portioned products for customers and household brands, such as Canderel and Silver Spoon.

It doesn’t stop there, as Portion Solutions also acts as a distributor for national brands such as Lotus Biscoff, Oatly and Trek bars. Its comprehensive market coverage and customer network across the UK and Ireland provides an ideal route to help maximise product distribution within foodservice and effectively develop brands’ customer reach.

Want to find out more? Get in touch now: enquiries@portionsolutions.co.uk