Page 230 - Bord Bia - Irish Foodservice Directory 2024

Catering options include coffee shops, retail shops, staff catering, student
catering, patient catering and 24-hour service manufacturing including
weekends.

Opportunities for Irish food and drink suppliers

The core list of ingredients tends to remain unchanged with variety and
innovation introduced via the company’s Food Platform development
team.

Chef forums are organised on a regular basis, at which new ideas and best
practices are shared with chefs from the various sites.

There is an ongoing drive to buy Irish and the company sources as much
product as possible from local suppliers and artisan producers, including
100% Irish beef, lamb, eggs, and milk products.

Purchasing policy and supplier requirements

Key elements of Sodexo’s purchasing policy are taste, price and food safety
standards.
All new products of interest are first reviewed by the company’s taste panel
headed by the Culinary Director.
Sodexo have clear policies and targets to achieve around animal welfare,
sustainability, modern slavery, carbon emissions, plastic, and food waste –
products and vendors are assessed on these criteria.

If the product passes the taste and CSR tests, then pricing is reviewed. The
next step in the purchasing process is a food safety audit of the supplier by
Sodexo Safeguard, the company’s food safety division.

The audit criteria are set by Sodexo and a charge applies for this.
Purchasing is centralised through the Sodexo Supply Management team.
The opinions of the Craft Development Team and taste panel are taken into
account when arriving at a purchasing decision.

Pricing is benchmarked against UK prices which are provided by Sodexo
UK. Although key tender dates are not fixed, all major contracts for supply
are for a fixed term. The length of the term varies and is set by the Category
Manager.

Each site places its own orders.

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