Following what many say could be the most challenging year for their businesses, where does that leave the future of foodservice?
Yesterday’s CPMA virtual town hall looked deeper into this subject.
While pivot may be a bit of an “it” word in the pandemic, it certainly applies to the kind of approach many foodservice establishments had to take. “If your business wasn’t set up to respond to take out very well, you had to make a lot of changes,” says Tom Bak of Etobicoke, ON-based Sysco Canada. That began by removing “nice-to-haves” and focusing on “must-haves.” “That was vegetables, fruit, fresh product that could be adapted to freezer/take-home applications in quantities that they could purchase them in,” says Bak. Rather than carrying large inventories, foodservice clients wanted smaller pack sizes with new delivery schedules. “In our healthcare business for example, customers wanted fewer deliveries with fewer people coming into their buildings,” says Bak.
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