After many years of unbroken and strong growth, the UK contract catering industry has endured a difficult time during the past two or three years, with negligible growth and a wave of adverse publicity for certain sectors of the market. This is despite the fact that in some areas of the business, huge advances have been made in terms of the quality of the catering offer and also the way in which this is marketed to its target consumer, whether this is an employee or a pupil.

This report considers the hypothesis that by steadily improving quality to as good as, or better than consumers can find on the high street, contract caterers will improve take-up of the services they offer. To achieve this, they need to bring their menus more in line with the expectations of today’s consumer in terms of healthy ingredients and environmentally friendly packaging and product sourcing.

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