Enterprise Hub Network - Case History
Gatwick Diamond Enterprise Hub
Stephen Wood
More Food
Company Background
After selling her coffee shop in Chichester, Caron Howe set up More Food Ltd in 2003 with her mother and a friend, handmaking premium quality cakes for the wholesale market.
Just five years later, the business has grown its annual turnover from £60,000 to £2m, and employs 50 people, working three shifts around the clock. New product development is a priority and the product range has expanded to include sponge cakes, tray bakes, muffins and individually wrapped cakes, using traditional hand making and baking techniques, and produced from top quality ingredients, sourced locally in the Chichester area wherever possible.
Quality issues are critical as the business is offering a premium product, and More Food employs a production manager, a quality manager and a master baker, to monitor quality and to focus on development of new product lines.
The business supplies to catering wholesale businesses which, in turn, supply to various outlets including garden centres, coffee shops and restaurants, and to coffee shop chains, national supermarket chains, including Budgens, Cook and, most recently, Waitrose.
Work with the Enterprise Hub
More Food Ltd has been working with Gatwick Diamond Enterprise Hub for the past couple of years, and has been chosen for the High Growth Programme. Assistance includes:
- A dedicated High Growth Business Coach
- Mentor support through Henley Business Coaching, focusing on development of a business plan and strategy for future growth
- Development of management processes to facilitate future growth
- Advice on business planning and equity release
- Legal advice and support
- Trade and local publicity
More Food Ltd managing director Caron Howe said: “Support from the Enterprise Hub has always been forthcoming, and I have been very fortunate to be chosen for the High Growth Programme. Since starting on this programme my outlook has changed, so that I now think about More Food in a much more broad-ranging and more confident manner.
“It is the support of the business coaches that has largely brought about this change, and this will help us in taking the business forward to its next stage of development.”
Gatwick Diamond Enterprise Hub director Steve Wood said: “Caron and More Food are a great example of our high growth clients. The business has grown steadily over the last five years and is now poised for a step change in its growth and business development. Caron recognised early that realising More Food’s full potential would also require a step change in the way it was doing business. They were a natural for the High Growth Business Coaching Programme and its really pleasing to see how Caron and the company have responded and developed.
What’s next
More Food’s recent launch into Waitrose has meant a huge increase in volumes for the company and this, coupled with the launch of an own-label range into Budgens under the Our Kitchen brand name, is keeping More Food busy as the business ensures that it continues to deliver top quality handmade cakes in vastly increased volumes.
A premises move is also imminent. The business is remaining in Chichester but will take on a new building. The project is a large-scale one – the management team is starting with a blank canvas for the new bakery, creating a bespoke design that will facilitate further future expansion.
