Foodservice Cateys 2022: Healthcare Caterer – Ashford & St Peter’s Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

Sponsored by Bidfood

Ashford and St Peter’s Hospitals (ASPH) NHS Foundation Trust provides acute hospital services in Surrey and the surrounding areas to more than 410,000 people. Post-pandemic, with the increased volume of patients, longer working hours and additional emotional and psychological pressures, the trust saw an intense focus on staff wellbeing within its hospitals.

Staff expectations were changing and on 1 October 2020 the board of the ASPH NHS Foundation approved insourcing retail catering services. Since then, turnover is back to its pre-Covid position: sales revenue has more than doubled to £1m in a year; and while ASPH previously saw 400 catering transactions each day, it now sees 1,200.

The ASPH board was keen to develop a strategy to improve staff health, productivity and wellbeing, and the partnership between ASPH NHS Foundation Trust with facilities management consultancy Neller Davies and caterer BM had a goal of providing customers with a comparable service to BM’s client base of legal firms and financial and technology organisations.

ASPH committed an initial £50,000 for equipment, training and resources, and BM introduced a raft of training programmes, including professional chef, management, barista, customer service development, and waste management training. Through this ASPH was able to adopt BM practices used in other professional services and offer them in the hospital setting.

The trust has since achieved five stars on environmental health visits across all its outlets. New technology has been implemented, including click and collect and app payment, and a range of food innovations, such as outdoor and indoor pop-ups, takeaway dishes for wards or the home, themed days, guest chefs, barbecues and ice-cream parlours.

To cope with the increased capacity, a new kitchen was built and opened in March 2022.Sustainability has also become more of a focus. For example, all meat and vegetables are now delivered in reusable crates and at least 50% of produce is sourced from local suppliers, cutting emissions and waste across the supply chain. Guests are also offered china crockery, metal cutlery and reusable cups, while disposables are compostable.

Within six weeks of opening ASPH had become a flagship site for the NHS. Prue Leith cited it as an example of best practice and Phil Shelley, chair of the Hospital Food Review, awarded ASPH exemplar status. ASPH ensured its enhanced catering offer remained affordable and accessible for staff, with a maximum meal cost of £4. At the end of service leftover meals are boxed and stored for selected staff who are struggling financially.

What the judges said

“Raouf Mansour and the team have revolutionised their hospital catering. Other healthcare caterers need to sit up and listen.” Sarah Prentice

“This is a seriously impressive achievement. I suspect we would all want to see this approach at every hospital, and this is reflected in the NHS using this case study for other hospitals.” Chris Stern

The shortlist

Ashford and St Peter’s Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in partnership with Neller Davies and BM

Caterplus

CH&Co Healthcare & Cleveland Clinic London

Signature Senior Lifestyle Catering and Hospitality

Past winners

2021 Signature Dining

2019 Sunrise Senior Living

2018 St Monica Trust

2017 Gracewell Healthcare

2016 St Andrew’s Healthcare

2015 Sunrise Senior Living

2014 ISS Healthcare

2013 Elior UK