The UK hospitality sector has been fully open for a few months now. Although not quite back to full capacity, people are enjoying being able to eat out again.
“We have seen a massive demand for our brand both in fresh potatoes and frozen chips,” explains Simon Martin, Co-founder of The Food Heroes and the Koffmann’s brand. “We are not completely sure why, but we have put a huge amount of work into this brand and promoting it. We have started supplying the Gordon Ramsey chain of restaurants and have had good support from him and other top chefs through social media.”
“We also decided to aid the hospitality sector where we can by supporting the charity Hospitality Action which provides invaluable help and support across the sector so we are all supporting each other.”
Koffmann’s do not supply retail, they decided instead to only supply a select group of regional family businesses through the wholesale and food service sectors as well some restaurant chains.
Claire Koffmann and Rachel Martin
“The hospitality sector opened up just as we were reaching the end of our potato season, so we asked some of our very good grower partners to supply us, we also imported new season product for the first time. This was a big investment for us but proved to be a great decision as it gave us continuity throughout July and August which can be tough months,” says Simon Martin.
As with other suppliers in the UK, costs for transport and packaging have increased. Koffmann decided to stick to one distribution partner for fresh; Turners and one for frozen; Premier Fruits.
“This has proven to be a good decision as we have not experienced the logistical problems which others have faced. The service from our distributors has been amazing,” says Simon.
The frozen range was launched just one week before the country went into lock down which made it tough, but according to Simon the people who buy the fresh range are the same people who are buying the frozen range and they fully backed the Koffmann brand.
The company have just expanded their range of frozen and are just four weeks away from the launch of a new range of root vegetables and onions. A range of sauces is planned for November.
