Proven Results with Foodservice Wholesalers
Explore how our 40 years of hands-on experience translates into measurable growth and sustainable trade partnerships for our clients. Our case studies demonstrate the real-world impact of strategic marketing implementation in the wholesale sector.
Client Success Stories
Trade Marketing Strategy
Birchall Foodservice — £12.5m to £50m
When Lisa joined Birchall Foodservice as a consultant, they were a £12.5m business with room to grow and no clear path to get there.
Over 10 years, Lisa built and executed the marketing and trade marketing strategy that took them to £50m annually — category growth, supplier partnerships, promotional planning, and route-to-market execution built around how caterers actually buy.
As part of that engagement, Lisa also designed and delivered Birchall OrderMate — a bespoke online ordering platform built from the ground up over four years. OrderMate won industry awards and was launched on both the App Store and Google Play, transforming how Birchall's customers order and how the business scales digitally. Result: £12.5m → £50m revenue over 10 years.
Supply Chain Optimization
Supplier Support Income
Most foodservice wholesalers are significantly underfunded by their suppliers. Not because the money isn't there — because nobody is negotiating it properly.
Lisa works directly with major suppliers — Unilever, Nestlé, Coca-Cola and others — to plan the next year's promotional activity for their brands and new launches. A marketing fee is agreed and that funded their activity and delivered significant income back to the wholesaler.
At Birchall Foodservice, Lisa grew annual supplier marketing investment to £300,000 — funding that directly underwrote their growth.
For most wholesalers, this money is already sitting in supplier budgets. It just needs someone who knows how to unlock it.
Sales Transformation
Growing Market Share at £780m — Brakes Foodservice
Brakes Foodservice is the biggest foodservice business in the UK, now part of Sysco. When Lisa was Head of Trade Marketing, the business had never hit on the budget targets— so the challenge was how to grow market share without it costing us any money.
Her answer was a share-of-wallet incentive scheme — the first programme in Brakes' history to grow market share without a single acquisition. Customers earned stars for every pound spent more with them that they had spent on average over the past 3 years, then redeemed those stars for prizes ranging from iPads to holidays abroad.
The scheme drove deeper spend from existing customers, stronger loyalty, and market share growth that didn't depend on winning a new account.
In 2013, Brakes, a business turning over billions, made £780m profit from its 26,000 Independent customers, an outstanding year for the Independent sector.
