While retailers continue to invest in food to go, Fife Creamery has expanded its own offer by opening a new training centre
A PICTURE might say a thousand words but when it comes to food, taste and smell take the driving seat, whether that’s at a Michelin Star restaurant or a forecourt convenience store.
Hoping to offer retailers a more sensory experience than a leaflet can provide, Fife Creamery got to work on a new food to go training centre in April of this year.
Now, with everything up and running and more than a few events under his belt already, Fife Creamery sales director Steve Appolinari wants to shout about the facility.
The bespoke training centre has no shortage of amenities for retailers with a view to improving the food to go offer in their store.
Immediately on entering, Fife Creamery’s smart looking hot hold counters are visible, backed by appetising imagery on the wall behind – just like an effective c-store food to go offer might look.
The counters are sourced from Cossiga, one of Fife Creamery’s equipment partners, a key selling point of the training room.
Everything retailers see, Fife Creamery can source, including an impressive piece of modern oven kit that Steve uses for food demonstrations on site.
The TurboChef Softa Rapid Cook Oven, supplied by Taylors UK, allows Steve to heat food far quicker than a conventional oven could manage.
Using a combination of convection and microwave heat, the TurboChef can cook anything from a humble scotch pie to a gluten-free pizza, with hundreds of programmable menu settings which take the effort out for store staff.
“That’s very significant, in this day and age – quick cook times,” said Steve, “speed of service is the new catchphrase.”
The TurboChef might be an impressive piece of oven engineering, but Steve is aware that it’s not for everyone.
For those not ready to invest in a top of the line super-quick oven, there are still plenty of options. Steve reckons something as simple as a soup kettle can make a massive difference to a convenience store’s bottom line, and he said the training centre is well equipped to cater for those dabbling in food to go for the first time.
“Entry level is something retailers are really needing to hear a bit more about. I think some are thinking ‘I can’t take that next step’.
“However, there’s a very simple step and that is making your own sandwiches and offering someone a cup of soup. Nothing could be simpler.”
As a pioneer of the soup and a sandwich lunch, Fife Creamery brought its first filling – egg mayonnaise – to the Scottish retail market in 1988, Steve is confident that store made sandwiches continue to be a major margin opportunity for retailers.
“The big difference is the profit opportunity. It’s a massive difference. That can be up to three times the margin of packaged sandwiches.
“By taking the humble sandwich filling tub and a carrier, be it a roll or a baguette, you get an ice cream scoop so you’ve got your portion control, and some nice simple packaging that we can supply as well.
“When you display that your average customer comes in and says ‘oh they’ve got the proper stuff’. From that spirals all the other things you can do. I’ve got the ingredients all here, and you tell me what you want to put in.”
Spiralling off from smart ovens, soup and sandwich solutions, Fife Creamery has also been sure to include coffee-to -go facilities in its training facility.
Aware of the competition that’s out there, Steve said he sought out quality product for the site, and he believes he’s found it with Scottish supplier Matthew Algie.
“The key to everything is the taste experience, if it’s not right you’ve wasted your time,” he said.
“I’ve been highly impressed with Matthew Algie. We needed simplicity, we needed something with a bit of style, but the other thing we did spend a bit of time on was price proposal. It’s very competitive.”
Just about all the food to go bases have been covered at the Fife Creamery training centre – including a smart breakfast bar complete with Edinburgh streetscape wall vinyl – but it wouldn’t be Fife Creamery without a chilled offer.
The training centre is equipped with a modern chiller, sourced from shopfitter and refrigeration specialist Vertex, who also worked on the refurbishment of the site earlier this year.
For retailers, the chiller offers an opportunity to engage in a bit of category management with suppliers, with a chance for both to pick up some merchandising tips, as Steve explained: “We very much want this to be interactive. We’re trying to bring people in here to gain their thoughts as well, and say ‘do you know what, we’ll come to your place now’. We have ten in our field sales team and they’ve all been involved so far.
“At the heart of this is going back to our roots because back in the very early days of Fife Creamery we were merchandising while going out on van sales.”
For any retailers who fancy a look at Fife Creamery’s training centre, Steve said the door is open and he hopes the site can improve performance both for his business and his retail customers.
“The agenda here is to find out all about the customer’s current facility. If there’s a desire to look at food to go at all we take them through a staged process. That staged process shows them how they can get involved at whatever level they wish,” he said.
“In doing so we will present a range of food products and menus that would fit what they think suits their business. We present packaging that would help the products, and we can talk equipment.
“On the same day, once we’ve done the talking and arrived at what we want to achieve we do live demonstrations.
“The main purpose of this training centre is to get customers in to have a live experience. We demonstrate every offer that fits the retailer’s demographic.”
Operating for just eight weeks when Scottish Grocer paid a visit, the training centre at Fife Creamery had hosted 25 presentations and, looking to the future, Steve said he’s hopeful the facility will stay just as busy in the years ahead.
