Know Your Product: Spotless Food Services

I often buy my lunch from the work “bistro” (I use the inverted comas there because it more closely resembles a cafeteria, but no one is apparently comfortable using that word anymore), so in aid of the blog, and my own decision making process, I decided to investigate what ingredients they’re using.

Since making the undertaking to eat more ethically, I’ve generally been sticking to their vegetarian selections, figuring it was a safe bet that any meat they are sourcing would not be free range. I couldn’t bet on the eggs, so I have also been avoiding these. As you can appreciate, in a commercial “filling foods = happy people” setting, this doesn’t leave much choice (ie. generally one meal a day, providing that meal doesn’t rely on eggs).

Like most people in Melbourne (perhaps Australia), my work’s catering is provided by Spotless, more specifically Alliance Catering, Spotless’ recently rebranded entry-level catering service (previously all their food services were simply referred to as Spotless).

Spotless’ three food service brands (Alliance, Epicure and Mustard Catering) provide catering services to schools, hospitals, aged care facilities, function and convention centres, prisons, airports and a variety of events. There is no doubt I’m forgetting some other facility or industry they cater for. Their own website states that their 14,000+ employees serve over 77 million customers every year, at 1,800 service facilities.

According to Spotless’ own “Quick Facts”, $2 Million per week is apparently budgeted to their 2,000+ chefs weekly for “fresh produce”. So, I’m figuring, some kind of free-range policy – eggs at least, given their comparable pricing to the cage alternative nowadays – would be in place. It’s more and more common for restaurants, cafes etc. to use free range eggs (at a minimum). That this is becoming the standard is a good thing, obviously.

It would be naïve to assume that Spotless (or Alliance, as their subsidiary), sources all of their produce ethically. As a large catering company, their objective is efficiency, consistency and maintaining low-costs, and the current cost of free-range pork products (for instance) is probably prohibitively expensive for these purposes. However, as above, the cost of free range eggs is not.

I jumped on Alliance’s website, hoping from some kind of clarity. Sadly, as you can see, it was not going to be that easy.

So, it was with some trepidation, and my middle-class eastern suburbs politeness gland working overdrive, that I drafted an e-mail to Alliance:

From: Wesley Mountain
Sent: Monday, 5 July 2010 11:18 AM
To: Alliance
Catering Info
Subject: Re: Free-range products

Hi,

I’m just writing to ask whether Alliance sources any of the animal products (eggs,
chicken meat, ham, pork etc.) used in catering from free-range farms?

I ask this as a consumer myself, but also because I am currently working on an
article investigating the use of free-range produce, particularly in cafes,
restaurants and bistros/cafeterias for an ethical eating blog.

I couldn’t find any details of the produce used on your website, so any help you
could provide would be really appreciated.

Thanks,

Wes Mountain

I received this response:

Sent: Friday, 9 July 2010 1:40 PM
To: Wesley Mountain
Subject: RE: Free-range products

Good afternoon in answer to your question yes we do currently use some products which are free-range whilst we don’t buy the products direct from the farm we use our suppliers to source the products.

Our menus change on regular basis so it is not easy to give you a list of products used.

As a company we are also looking at a number of initiatives lowering food miles by buying local products, incorporating free range and purchasing cage free eggs and using environmental packaging.

Alliance catering is part of the Spotless business so some projects take time to implement we also have issues with supply of the products.

Cindy (surname removed)
Brands & Standards Manager
Alliance Catering

My response was thus:


So, having received little clarity on the issue I decided to press further. I replied, with vigour. Okay, it was with a polite tone, and my stern “I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed” boots on.

From: Wesley Mountain
Sent: Friday, 9 July 2010 4:30 PM
To: Cindy
Subject: RE: Free-range products

Hi Cindy,

Thanks for your response.

I think it’s great that Alliance, as a company, is looking to reduce food miles and source more produce from local producers, particularly if there is an intention to ensure that that produce is ethically farmed. I understand that for such a large
company, a project like this will take some time, and an immense amount of planning.

Can I ask a few further questions, for clarification?

With regard to the intentions of your future initiatives, I am interested to know whether minimum targets for ethically farmed animal products will be set, or whether a more cost-based approach (ie. if it costs more than a
capped amount to purchase free-range eggs, this option will not be pursued) will
be the basis of decision making process. I understand that this may not be a
question you can answer at this moment, but as a consumer decisions like these
do affect the way I shop and eat, and any transparency you can offer on this
would be greatly appreciated.

In the short term, based on what I know of dealing with Spotless/Alliance in various places I’ve worked, events I’ve attended etc, it would seem that a lot of Alliance’s facilities are semi-autonomous, ie. the resident cook/chef would create the menu and then order produce in conjunction with the manager, presumably through a contracted preferred supplier.

In this instance, would you direct customers to ask staff at their work cafes, bistros, etc about whether their food contains free-range produce? Would staff be able to provide this information definitively, at present?

Thanks again for your previous response, and I
look forward to hearing from you.

Healthy
Regards,

Wes
Mountain

This response came much quicker.

From: Cindy
Sent: Friday, 9 July 2010 5:00 PM
To: Wesley Mountain
Subject: RE: Free-range products

Hi Wes,

In regards to the intentions of supply of the products it does come down to both cost and supply our procurement department are currently negotiating with a number of suppliers to see if we can get some better deals on price if we purchase as a whole for example cage free eggs whilst we understand it will inevitably cost us more we still hope to achieve this. So in answer to your question it may be a case that we use them in some contracts but not all.

We also have locked in prices with our contracts so this means we must wear the extra cost as a business, so yes price is an issue, we may however be able to negotiate a slight price increase with our customers given the fact we are giving a better product.

With the menus it is normally the higher end sites that have these products and are normally advertised on the menu.

Cindy
Brands & Standards Manager
Alliance Catering

My reaction was a little less puzzled this time, perhaps more defeated.

So… basically, while there’s a (very small) nod to ethical concerns
here, it’s not a considered policy. It’s not publicly stated, and thus not
transparent. There are no clear targets (at least stated), and the brand manager
is not really able to answer my questions fully.

But… we do have a real
answer here, in a way: No, Spotless does not have a policy with regards to free
range products, and there is no guarantee that what you’re eating is free range
in this kind of business, unless it’s clearly stated on the menu.

I will admit, it angers me that such a large company isn’t using their leverage to
support ethical produce, especially given the support of a large company could
reduce the cost of ethically farmed products for both the company and retail
consumers. But, it would probably be a significant cost for them in the short
term, and I understand that that may not seem worthwhile. They’re not paying
actuaries to work out these kinds of decisions, it’s simply about sourcing cheap
supply. But $2 Million nationwide is a lot of money to throw at a problem.

So… this is me now:


You win some, you lose some. You all have
the clarity you need to know that you can’t buy anything containing eggs, pork
or chicken from Spotless food services if you want to be sure it’s ethically
sourced.

Kim has been doing some interesting investigation herself into
high-end restaurants and their produce sources, but I’ll leave that to her.