Building successful supply chain partnerships doesn’t come cheap. But it’s the investment of time that can prove the most significant factor in securing long-term ethical results, according to bosses at catering firm BaxterStorey
he humble egg is not, on the face of it, something that springs to mind when you think of a supply chain challenge, but for Westbury Street Holdings (Westbury), owner of the BaxterStorey, Caterlink and Holroyd Howe operations, set on sourcing purely free range to meet their commitment to ethical and quality produce, it was quite an undertaking. Clients, who could be anything from schools to Formula 1 teams or bank executives, are increasingly keen to see good animal welfare in-step with public sentiment, so last year Westbury, which has an annual purchasing bill in excess of £120M, moved to purely free-range RSPCA Freedom Farm-assured egg supply at the 800 sites where it caters – that is 7.5M eggs a year sourced from a single site, family-owned Staveley’s Eggs farm in Chorley, Lancashire. The decision, facilitated by wholesaler 3663 First for Foodservice, goes beyond impending European Union legislation that will phase out basic battery hen cages from the start of 2012. From the caterer’s point of view it is in-keeping with its ethical standards (the eggs are RSPCA Freedom Food certified), and presents its chefs and customers with a higher quality product at no additional cost due to the increased volume – a win-win for caterer, customer, distribu- tor and producer alike.
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“Although there’s always a certain financial commitment with a deal of this size, it’s actually the time invest- ment and risk to your hard won repu- tation that are the biggest factors,” says Ian Platt, BaxterStorey’s supply chain manager. “I’m sure if we had a manage- ment consultant come in and look at all the extra hours myself and the procurement team have spent visiting producers and building relationships for this and other projects over the years they’d be aghast, but it’s exactly that married to a partnership approach with those within the supply chain that gets results.” Platt concedes that a commitment to qual- ity and providence is part of the DNA of BaxterStorey and the wider organisation, so in reality he and his team are always going to go the extra mile (unlike the company’s pro- duce, which is regionally sourced and comes
30 | Sustainable Business | June 2011
Eggs and
ethics
from no further than 80 miles for units inside the M25 and 150 miles round trip for units outside the motorway). BaxterStorey’s ethos sits
well with Dave Staveley, who points out that such an arrangement does not have to be the purchasing equivalent of pulling teeth. “We pride ourselves on maintaining high welfare standards, superior quality and full traceability throughout all sectors of our business to ensure all our customers receive the finest quality eggs from our own flocks,” he says. While
the reputation that Westbury had built within the supply chain meant it was
known to Dave Staveley when the initial approach was made, it had no such advantage when attempting to source all its meat from the UK. That challenge was overcome and the lamb, beef, pork and poultry it has served for the past few years has been locally sourced, aside from bacon, which remained unresolved until last year.
British consumers want to support UK farming, but they remain price conscious and if there is too big a disparity that is where their commitment ends. Among the UK’s bacon suppliers there existed a vicious circle where the domestic price – thanks to the fact that UK has the highest animal welfare standards in Europe – was significantly higher than Danish rivals. Producers in the UK needed to invest
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