Bidfood
Bidfood is one of the UK’s leading foodservices providers, supplying schools and colleges in the UK. We are passionate about food and are proud to offer our customers a choice of over 13,000 Own Brand and branded lines from essential ingredients to ready-to-finish products; catering supplies; tableware and cleaning products. We can offer schools support with compliant menu cycles, product ranges to meet school food standards and products to help schools attain ‘Food for Life’ status.
Case study: A Decade of Trust and Quality
Our commitment to providing delicious, nutritious meals to schools is made possible through strong partnerships with trusted suppliers.
We have worked with Bidfood for over 10 years and as one of our primary food suppliers, Bidfood ensures the robustness of our supply chain while maintaining competitive costs. We have a long-standing relationship with Bidfood, a key supplier that plays an essential role in ensuring high-quality ingredients reach our school kitchens.
With an extensive range of suppliers and food categories, Bidfood enables us to offer diverse and high-quality menu choices using fresh and sustainable ingredients that meet the expectations of schools, parents and children.
The Value of Bidfood’s Support
Bidfood is more than just a supplier; they are a true partner in our mission to deliver quality meals. Their support extends beyond logistics and pricing—they contribute significantly to our operations by:
· Providing seamless account management to maintain efficiency.
· Hosting expos and supplier demonstrations that inspire culinary innovation.
· Facilitating food development days with expert-led insights.
· Championing sustainability initiatives aligned with our values.
· Added value to support our teams with industry challenges, sector topics, inspiration, innovation and more.
Bidfood also support us with keeping up to date on the latest products and innovation in the market. We attended Taste of Bidfood at the back end of last year to see new product development, B Corp suppliers, and gained valuable inspiration to implement onto our own menus.
Additionally, Vicki Hislop, National Account Manager at Bidfood, visited Belmont School in Harrow with me during NSMW and supported HCL to promote awareness and the importance of eating superhero vegetables to children. Bidfood share our mission to make nutritious school meals something kids look forward to everyday.
Andrew Sugden, Head of Food, Procurement & IT at HCL
LACA Partner Q&A with Gavin Squires, Business Development Controller - Education - Bidfood
What is your school food unique selling point?
Bidfood is a leading foodservice supplier to private and public sector caterers focused on service excellence, great food, real value, sustainability and a forward thinking approach. Aside from our great service, the Education team at Bidfood are both passionate as well as specialists within this field. We live and breathe Education catering, working closely with our customers to tackle challenges and help them to create the best school meal offering to students.
What new products/services have you launched or are looking to launch in 2024?
We have some phenomenal partnerships with several local suppliers who we work collaboratively with, but also in conjunction with our customers. This year has seen the development of several gluten free and Red Tractor products which have an element of hidden veg within them which has been specially picked for our Education customers. We are also continuing to work on more recipes which include some of our NPD and we cannot wait to share what these products will be…. so watch this space!
We have also partnered with CarbonCloud, a pioneer in climate change intelligence technology. With state-of-the-art automation CarbonCloud’s innovative platform will provide us and our suppliers the opportunity to connect securely and seamlessly for better climate insights. As a first stage, we will have the initial climate footprint of our product range calculated swiftly in 2024.
What do you do to support the school food service?
We believe that the support that we give to the Education sector is second-to-none. Our Education Development Chef, Wayne Wright who won the Public Sector Chef of the Year Award provides menus and recipes to schools, hosts customer development days for clients, visits school kitchens, and holds cookery sessions with parents and children. On top of that, we also provide school customers support on allergens, nutrition, and recipe inspiration, all of which can be found on Bidfood Direct, our award winning eCommerce site.
As a leading foodservice supplier, we also share the latest insights, trends, and industry support which can be found both on our education webpage, as well as our termly newsletter which we send out to our customers.
How can LACA and school food operators support your organisation?
I think we all have to work together, keep dialogue and share information. The school food offering needs serious help in terms of funding as well as staffing. We have to work together to make sure our collective message is heard and keep up the pressure on feeding our children and next generation.
What is your first memory of school food?
Definitely the smell when you walked in the dining room and the friendly face of Olive our school cook who was there to greet you and serve you an amazing main course and pudding. I always looked forward to Thursday because it was roast dinner day and it was always followed by a jam and coconut sponge with custard – my favourite!