PUBLISHER'S VIEWPOINT
December 2005
What a World Foodservice Is

I’m known to say that the foodservice equipment and supplies industry is a small town, maybe a village. But our annual Worldwide Buyers Guide is a reminder that it’s also a world, literally.

We created this database of global suppliers because John Sowerby, then head of purchasing for Pizza Hut, and Lyall Newby, a good friend who still works for Yum! Brands, asked us to tell them who made everything in the world. They were expanding worldwide and wanted to be a good neighbor who bought in the local market.

The updating task is never finished or ever perfect, but Chris Palmer and I work hard a good chunk of each year to make sure we have suppliers everywhere and have their data current. And this guide you hold in your hands is only a select listing of suppliers, as the database is so large it cannot be fully contained in the print version. For the full database, go to our Web site, www.fermag.com . There you’ll find links to company e-mails and Web sites.

The reason we produce the guide is clear. Newby and his colleagues are still expanding globally—they’re building 200 units a year in China!—as are their competitors at McDonald’s and a host of other chain restaurant and hotel groups from every corner of the globe. And all of them are looking for the equipment and supplies needed to do the job. We find evidence of the global nature of our industry almost everywhere we go. In October, for example, I spent three days at HOST, the big biennial equipment and supplies show staged at the new Milan Fiera facility in Italy. (Next month you’ll see some of the new products I found there.)

Americans aren't the only ones sourcing globally.  Maybe this guide has helped the process.

Happily, I saw many American friends exhibiting in Milan. I met with European suppliers who are also players in North America and the rest of the world, either under their own brands or with partners. I even visited with an American company that’s making products in China and selling those items only in that country.

And I saw a lot of products manufactured in Asia or Eastern Europe appearing in scores of European suppliers’ booths, a reminder that Americans aren’t the only ones sourcing globally. Maybe in a small way this directory has helped the process. The reason global foodservice development takes place was apparent outside the show hall.

With all their varied tastes, foodservice customers know no borders, and chains operating in Europe understand they must cater to a broader and broader demographic. Case in point: I stuck my head in a McDonald’s Café in the famous Galleria just off Milan’s Duomo piazza.

They had a special menu promotion: Asian products. I found egg rolls, an Asian burger, special potatoes and a “Dragon” shake on the menu, and I tried them all. It’s my job.

Have a healthy, peaceful and profitable 2006.

Cheers,

Robin Ashton
Publisher