You’re responsible for buying food for your organisation. It could be a hotel, a chain of restaurants or an airline – any business where food matters.
You appreciate that people’s experiences with food is a major reason for them to return or recommend you. The Internet provides immediate reaction and opinion like never before. Get it wrong, be out of stock, offer the same old boring choices as everyone else and you’ll soon notice the difference where it really counts – on your bottom line.
So who do you turn to for help?
BD Foods have, since 2001, been addressing and solving these problems. Based on a strategy decision to be flexible, reactive and hugely responsive, we have developed partnerships with major national names who appreciate our hand crafted, artisan, innovative approach to our accompaniments. We are not ‘just another supplier’ – we are Chefs working with, and for, other Chefs. All of our development staff have years of experience as a Chefs, and are quite simply food people first and manufacturers second.
A day in the life of Sarah Williams: Head Business Development Chef
Every day is different, especially when we have such a large and diverse range of products.
I could be making a chutney in the morning, followed by a gravy, 2 soups and a jelly and then in the afternoon move onto Caribbean dips and Korean broths! This is what makes my job so exciting and rewarding and I relish the thought of what each day could bring.
We have a large and diverse customer base. So my main role is to help the team fulfil and hopefully surpass our customer's expectations from a chefing point of view. Whether it is through matching a product, following a given recipe, improving a current recipe or even just creating a recipe from just a title for a sauce, chutney or meal accompaniment.
My role also encompasses seeing products through from the initial recipe created all the way to product launch in the factory, to help make sure that the products we produce really are the top standard.
As well as creating new recipes and products wherever possible, as a collective we also like to look at our own existing range and look to improve and expand.
Being a chef my life pretty much revolves around food. In my spare time I tend to read about and keep up to date with what is going on in the food industry. I also like to keep an eye on current food trends whilst out and about, even when eating a meal out with friends or family I am always looking, thinking and absorbing as much as I can, as to work in New Product Development you have to be forever proactive to maintain the cutting edge.
The common technical manager can be found at 6am each morning on her way to B D Foods where she will spend the day foraging for ways of improving the company procedures, practices and systems of working. She is ever alert for signs of danger such as non-conforming products and practices or gaps in training that need to be addressed. She is often approached by customers and suppliers from far off places such as Birmingham or Leeds who require her assistance and technical knowledge. As a friendly soul she will freely give this.
She works very closely with other species such as NPD (a creative bunch), purchasing (they roam far and wide) and production (a highly skilled and well trained group) to make sure that everything coming in and out of the factory is of great quality and is safe and compliant with all relevant legislation. She is the ‘gate keeper’ of the BD Foods jungle.
) to ensure the company is complaint against BRC and customer own audits standards.
Food safety and consistently high standards of product quality are the overriding priorities at BD Foods and our robust standards of technical compliance are rigorously enforced, monitored and maintained.
Raw materials, work-in progress materials and final product testing and assessment
Formal in-house shelf life testing of all new and existing products
Maintenance and upkeep of an extensive bank of over 3,000 of our product recipes and specifications.
BD Foods recognises that our commercial and corporate activities impact on our stakeholders – those individuals or groups who are affected directly and indirectly by our activities and achievements.
We are committed to balancing the ethical and social components of our business. To ensure that we are acting in an ethical manner at all times, we have produced an Ethical Trading Policy to clearly define the measures we have in place to reassure our stakeholders that we act in an ethical manner above and beyond our basic legal requirements.
As a socially responsible company our stakeholders have a right to expect:
Products manufactured and sourced by BD Foods are produced under working conditions that are hygienic and safe
All workers involved in the production of BD Foods products, from direct suppliers and sub-contractors, through to manufacturing site and supply chain, are treated with full consideration to their basic human rights
BD Foods acts in an ethical manner above and beyond basic legal requirements
BD Foods is therefore committed to following and implementing their principals of the Ethical Tradition Initiative Base Code (although we are not members of the ETI).
Our policy sets out BD Foods commitment to its stakeholders, setting out the measures we are taking to ensure that we are acting in an ethical manner.
Modern slavery is a crime and a violation of fundamental human rights. It takes various forms, such as slavery, servitude, forced and compulsory labour and human trafficking, all of which have in common the deprivation of a person's liberty by another in order to exploit them for personal or commercial gain. We have a zero-tolerance approach to modern slavery and we are committed to acting ethically and with integrity in all our business dealings and relationships and to implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to ensure modern slavery is not taking place anywhere in our own business or in any of our supply chains.
