The UK wholesale fresh produce markets’ recent portrayal by the BBC was not the positive picture hoped for by the market traders.
However, I felt the programmes served a useful purpose in showing the industry just how far the majority involved have come from their roots. This includes myself, who spent 17 very happy years in Covent Garden, and now enjoy mutually successful trading relationships with all the wholesale markets throughout the UK.
The unasked question in the programmes was why the wholesale food markets are apparently immune to change and subsequently stuck in both a commercial and human time warp. I believe, through both personal experience and observing the success of my competitors, the answer lies with our respective customers.
The major supermarkets and foodservice operators are very hard taskmasters indeed, demanding high levels of technical and commercial expertise from their suppliers. I often hear growers and marketing companies bemoaning these demands, however, it is this very pressure to reach ever higher levels of service and performance that has created the gap which continues to widen between the wholesale markets and their opposite numbers in the retail and foodservice supply sector.
This is because the companies supplying sophisticated customers are able to recruit the very best staff from outside our industry. These recruits come from a wide pool of experience, such as the branded food and consumer marketing sector, the financial, IT and food technical arena, the supply chain and logistics sector, or young newly qualified graduates. Among the responsibilities these individuals are covering include consumer insight, IT support and development, and new product research and development.
These areas are totally different to those essential trading skills that are common to both wholesale markets and retail and foodservice suppliers. The non-wholesale market companies, and the worldwide growers who supply them, are also willing and able to invest heavily in their businesses, whether it be new growing techniques, modern distribution and packing facilities and industry-leading IT systems.
These businesses have created a virtuous circle of continual improvement that has led to the gap between the two disciplines. The most successful wholesale companies have prospered despite this lack of pressure from their customer base, and should be praised because of this fact.
They should feel justifiably let down by the picture painted by the BBC. Thankfully viewers’ memories are short and news has a life even briefer than strawberries! -
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