Food and drink - and why it's so important to Gloucestershire
What’s the UK’s biggest manufacturing sector and at times its fastest growing? Food and drink. Prof David Hughes spoke to the sector's Gloucestershire firms and revealed the key to future success.
Dear readers,
We hope you’re had a great week.
It’s a week which saw the biggest careers fair of its kind ever take place at Gloucestershire Racecourse.
We did a big interview with the business that was the headline sponsor of the Circle2Success event, US technology firm L3Harris, in which one of its UK bosses, Ian Menzies, told us why it was a very good time to be in the market for a job in his sector.
We also covered off news of a special bootcamp due to be staged by one of the Founding Partners that helps make this digital magazine possible.
Randall & Payne’s Will Abbott is due to stage one of his regular business bootcamps to support county businesses next week, but after the bombshell of the Budget’s National Insurance announcement he has just announced a second gathering for business leaders.
In this second session he promises to reveal a sure-fire way for you to negate some of those extra costs as a result of the changes to NI.
You can read all that here.
Today, we deliver you some business briefing notes and a little heads-up of some events due to take place this weekend, but the real focus is the result of our trip to the latest Food for Thought event.
Staged in support of the Made in Gloucestershire initiative, which aims to foster a support community for small food and drink businesses in Gloucestershire and to help them grow, it made us think just what it was all about and why.
It’s about the fastest-growing sector in the UK, that’s what, how important it is to Gloucestershire and why Food for Thought could be the key to the success of the SMEs we have here in the county.
We usually paywall our Friday editions, but not today! You can thank our Founding Partners, Founding Members and paying subscribers for that.
Have a great weekend.
Andrew Merrell (editor).
NB: Raikes publishes probably the best-read business-related email ‘newsletter’, pound for pound, in Gloucestershire.
If you have a story, an issue, a news item, a charity or an interview you want us to write about or investigate, challenge the powers that be on, then please email me: andrew.merrell@raikesjournal.co.uk.
Your briefing notes…
😋 Gloucester Food Dock has announced that the last unit in its successful waterside stable of eateries will be taken by Roots + Seeds Café & Kitchen, which already has a restaurant at Cirencester Park. The new venue will be open for breakfast through to the evenings, with head chef Sam Idoine creating menus using locally sourced produce, including Roots + Seeds very own garden. The business was co-founded by Toby Baggott and Sam Lawson-King.
🫡 Ian Mean, awarded an MBE in 2023 for his services to the community of Gloucestershire, is stepping back from his role at Business West. Mean will continue his work with the county council’s new economic growth board, the Forest of Dean Economic Partnership and Gloucestershire Hospitals Organ Donation Committee. Phil Smith, managing director of Business West, which represents chambers of trade West-wide, praised Mean’s “phenomenal contribution, commitment, drive, energy and dedication”. Gloucestershire, said Smith, continued to be a key focus.
💷 Are apprenticeships really as cost-effective as claimed?
With rising National Insurance and other costs, apprenticeships could be a smart solution for affordable business growth and staff development. Tatiana Ameri of Gloucestershire College explains why taking on an apprentices is a good return on investment for firms - even more so since the NI rise announced in the Autumn Budget. Ameri runs through the argument in favour and explains how the college can arrange most of the process for you. You can read the full article on our Expert Insight page.
💷 HR Champions Ltd, a provider of HR services and leadership and management training and development in the region, has announced the transfer of its HR support division to HR People Support. The acquisition was effective from 27 November is said to allow HR Champions to focus on the continued growth and development of its core training offerings.
Ideas for the weekend?
Friday: 🎭 Pantomime season is here. Aladdin plays at The Everyman, Cheltenham, today, tomorrow and onwards until Sunday 12 January.
🎄 Tetbury is staging a Christmas fair tonight, from 6.30pm.
Saturday:
🎭 More pantomime. The Roses Theatre, Tewkesbury. Cinderella runs from Sat 30 Nov to Sat 4 Jan, with multiple showtimes.
⚽ 🏉 Gloucester Rugby play Northampton Saints and Cheltenham Town play Cheltenham Town. Both away at 3pm. Gloucester City play Pool Town at home at 3pm.
Sunday:
🏉 Gloucester-Hartpury play Bristol Bears at Kingsholm at 2pm.
* Everything you read on The Raikes Journal is made possible by our incredible Founding Partners: QuoLux, Willans LLP, Gloucestershire College, Merrell People and Randall & Payne, our sponsors Hartpury University and Hartpury College, our Founding Members and wonderful paying subscribers.
If you upgrade to paid you’ll be part of this community interest company too. In an era when local journalism is all but gone and websites are covered in pop-ups andadvertorials, lists and unedited press releases, we are dedicated to delivering quality journalism for Gloucestershire, to championing the county, in particular its businesses, charities, education and training providers, and to helping create an even stronger community. If you upgrade to paid you will be able to see past the paywalls often on our second and third email editions of the week, that lock all our archive after two weeks and lock our rolling Top 100 Businesses in Gloucestershire series that follows the financial fortunes of our biggest firms by turnover. You will be able to comment on our stories too. You’ll be helping make this CIC sustainable.
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Food and drink - and why it's so important to Gloucestershire
What’s the UK’s biggest manufacturing sector and at times its fastest growing? Food and drink. Prof David Hughes spoke to the sector's Gloucestershire firms and revealed the key to future success.
By Andrew Merrell.
Professor David Hughes (pictured above) had just finished his near hour and a half lecture on the food and drink sector when he stepped to one side and revealed the real secret to success for county SMEs.
Hughes had just addressed delegates at the latest Food for Thought event, the latest in a series backed by The Growth Hub, Made in Gloucestershire, the county council, Social & Social and Encore PR, and designed to support county food and drink businesses.
It’s a sector much overlooked, despite every single person’s reliance on it and the county’s long list of exciting and exciting food and drink related firms, part of a sector that nationally is among our most economically significant.
Hughes had covered off how major stores market and sell food and drink, consumer trends, challenges facing businesses of all sizes, sustainability, health, provenance and climate change, and changing tastes, but there was one ingredient he missed from his talk.
That ingredient, he confirmed, was key to the success of all SMEs.
And it is the very ingredient created by the Food for Thought initiative and Made in Gloucestershire, which seeks to bring together and raise the profile of the many producers, manufacturers, innovators in the sector in the county.
“Getting together like this can be more important than listening to all the talking.
“It’s that interaction where they can share their problems and possible solutions, share their processes,” said Professor Hughes, whose entire career has been spent in the sector from board member to business owner and now international speaker.
He is known to many simply as Doctor Food.
“What becomes self-evident for me when I speak to groups like this is if you are not passionate about what you are doing you are not going to achieve.
“Most people in the food and drink sector running small businesses go over and above to make them work and rely on that passion to get them through and become successful.
“Coming together to share experiences like this is not just important and educational, it is fundamental to making that success happen and making sure they win through.”
James Ashe, one of the founders of Food for Thought CIC, said that was exactly what the series of events, talks and panel discussions was all about.
“This is all about bringing together the food and drink sector here in Gloucestershire. We believe it is an important sector that needs a boost.
“We have a lot of innovative companies, but they are often operating in isolation, and we think if we can bring them together it will benefit everyone – and lead to greater success too,” said Ashe, who also runs the Cheltenham-based creative communications agency Mighty.
Courtney Conroy is a founder of Cheltenham-based Ritual Coffee, one of the businesses that has signed up to benefit from the Food for Thought series.
She was at the event at Clavell & Hind’s taproom and brewery at Elmstone Hardwicke, and agreed there was real benefit in getting to know the other food and drink businesses in Gloucestershire and the series was the perfect way to start that process.
“It’s really helpful to come together like this and share ideas. There is a sense that we are all in it together.
“Some things might be out of your control, but the more knowledge you have and the more support, the better your prospects,” said Conroy.
Clara Cardillo, of Italian food and drink business Cotswold Cardillo, said: “I believe sharing experience is good for small businesses.
“When you meet you find that people are often facing the same challenges and you can learn from each other, you feel less lonely, stronger, more able to succeed. Supporting one another is vital.”
Jordan Doig-David, of Stonehouse-based health food business Feel Complete, said: “I think it’s important to meet other people going through the same experiences, or who have already overcome those challenges.
“It speeds up your learning. You still have to jump the hurdles, but you can do it quicker when you fast-forward your learning.”
Dev Chakraborty, growth and enterprise manager at Gloucestershire County Council, the body that now oversees the Made in Gloucestershire initiative, said: “The food and drink industry is a hugely important sector to the Gloucestershire economy.
“Made in Gloucestershire launched just over two years ago following the covid pandemic and the initiative was designed to support the food, drink and hospitality sector that had been particularly affected by it.
“Made in Gloucestershire aims to encourage residents and businesses in the county to ‘think local’ and to support their local producers.
“It has proved popular with visitors to the county and helps the smaller food and drink producers, farms shops and hospitality venues to raise their profile.
“Membership is currently free and we are exploring opportunities to ensure the programme can continue through a commercial model.”
Made in Gloucestershire currently has more than 160 members and affiliates, organisations and businesses that want to work with independent producers and hospitality venues in the county.
Food and Drink part 2: The bigger picture…
In a county where the exciting sector of cyber seems to often dominate the social media-sphere the significance of our food and drink industry can often be lost.
Which is odd, as according to the Government it’s the UK’s biggest manufacturing sector by turnover, valued at £104.4 billion and in the last few months its fastest growing too.
That’s larger than the automotive and aerospace industries combined – the former well represented in Gloucestershire (look up GE Aviation or Safran), and the latter here too in the guide of GTekt.
In its speed of growth it’s a match for ‘tech’ or ‘finance’ at times, sometimes even better.
In October this year the latest Lloyds UK Sector Tracker report revealed food and drink manufacturers recorded the fastest output growth of all sectors for the fourth consecutive month.
The UK grocery market has been growing continuously for over a decade.
That market was most recently valued at over £241 billion.
For the food and drink service sector, the market value is estimated to be just short of $73 billion (US dollars) in 2022.
“The UK presents many opportunities for exporters, investors, and international buyers, with key capabilities across the food and drink supply chain and all stages of product development,” according to the UK Government.
“It provides a strong base for research and development with clear and defined routes to market, making it well-placed to meet the demands of consumers.”
Working out just how large it is in Gloucestershire is hard to do.
It’s so often lumped in with tourism or agriculture, but if we name-drop the likes of Lucozade, Dairy Partners, Müller Milk & Ingredients Severnside, Cotteswold Dairy, Severn, Futura Foods UK Limited and Wye Smokery you start to get the idea of the scale of some of those firms – they’re often multi-million pound multi-national businesses and certainly major employers.
As well as manufacturing and agriculture Gloucestershire does other aspects of the food business well too. Staverton-headquartered Creed Foodservice, experts in the supply of food and drink to all manner of clients including the National Trust, was bought this year in a deal worth £70 million.
And then there are the many small food and drink suppliers, the ones that excite us.
They are the ones that inspire us to believe the idea of ‘buying local’ is good, and that ‘home-grown’ and ‘planet-friendly’ can be possible afterall. They give us hope.
This brings us to the 100-plus such firms which are members of Made in Gloucestershire, the organisation set up to champion the start-ups, the smallest and some of the most exciting, the ones that might just become the big businesses of tomorrow – and which might fall within the sights of the big firms looking to expand by acquisition.
Members include Sibling Distillery, Gloucester Brewery, Wolfy’s, When in Rome, MOR Bakery, Ethical Addictions, Purslane Restaurant, Forest Deli, Cinderhill Farm, and Eastington Farm Shop.
Pair food and drink with hospitality and tourism and it’s worth an estimated £1 billion annually to Gloucestershire, according to the best figures we could find. That’s about five per cent of a total economy worth in the region of £20 billion.
Back in 2017 it was estimated 32 per cent of tourist spending in Gloucestershire was devoted to food and drink, some £340 million annually with the county having an estimated 6,055 staff employed in food and drink manufacturing. That’s probably redefining again what the ‘food and drink sector’ is.
Lump food and drink in with agriculture and its supply chain and as a sector it employs over 50,000 people, nearly 15 per cent of the county’s workforce, and it becomes a slice of the economy that in 2017 (again, figures are difficult to find) generated a GVA of £1.39 billion – that was 8.8 per cent of the local economy. Both those figures are higher shares of the economy than seen nationally.
What does 2025 look like?
Nationally, predictions for the coming year are a continued growth trajectory.
The market is projected to increase in size with some forecasts as positive as nearly 40 per cent rise by 2028 compared to 2019. The main driver - the convenience food industry.
Yes, you might have thought we were all into healthy eating now and cooking, judging by the number of cookery and baking programmes we consume?
But as Professor Hughes said in his talk to Made in Gloucestershire members at the Food for Thought event we cover above, ‘be careful, consumers tend to say one thing, and do something quite different!’.
The most recent report by the Food and Drink Federation (FDF), its Q2 State of Industry Report, tracks business confidence and trends in the UK’s largest manufacturing sector.
It reveals that nearly nine out of 10 food and drink manufacturers expect to maintain or increase investment levels over the coming year.
According to the FDF this is “a signal that the sector has turned the corner after the policy turmoil and external shocks that have disproportionately impacted food and drink businesses, leading to a 30 per cent drop in investment since 2019”.
The findings underscore that the food and drink manufacturing industry is ready to invest, but also warns the Government’s industrial strategy will be key to this happening.
“Notably over one-third of manufacturers plan to increase their R&D spend over the coming year,” said the report.
“By working in partnership with Government we can seize investment opportunities and remove barriers to growth.
“Advancing innovation and adopting new technologies are critical for economic growth, and to safeguard the UK’s long-term food security.”
Key to this is a Government that removes “policy and regulatory uncertainty, and non-tariff barriers could risk denting the industry’s export competitiveness”.
A big feature of which relates to the European Union. In 2023, 57 per cent of food exports went to the EU and 72 per cent of imports came from the EU.
You can find out about more Food for Thought events on its website.