Ingredients A Roadmap to
Ingredients A Roadmap to Sustainable Ingredients Wim van Roekel, President of Europe & Africa, Griffith Foods discusses its ambitious roadmap for growth to 2030, new product launches across countries and continents and why sustainable choices matter now more than ever. By Ian Healey Wim van Roekel Please tell us a little about Griffith Foods and your background? Founded in 1919 and now in the fourth generation of family leadership, Griffith Foods is a global product development partner specialized in food ingredients. From farmers to customers, the relationships it forms with its partners allow Griffith Foods to create better products that are delicious and nutritious for consumers, and foster a better, more sustainable world. Today, the Griffith Foods family of companies operates in more than 30 countries on six continents, employing over 4,800 people, including more than 40 chefs and 340 food scientists. We collaborate with food companies worldwide to create fully customized recipes for the constantly evolving food marketplace, partnering with you from ideation to production. Our product portfolio consists of seasonings, sauces and dressings, and coatings, Our mission is to help customers succeed through collaborative innovation and the supply of tailored seasonings, sauces, dressings and premium coatings where we tailor everything from flavor and functionality to meet your unique needs. In many ways our purpose – “we blend care and creativity to nourish the world” – captures the essence of our existence and values as a business. As President of Europe and Africa for almost 4 years, we’ve grown significantly and have put an ambitious but achievable growth plan in place all the way to 2030. We’ve taken our core capabilities as culinary experts and looked to evolve these through new partnerships and ecosystems where shared values and new technologies and benefit all. Previous to that my career was been a mix of corporate positions in the food industry as well as running my own business. Describe the Griffith Foods Business Plan for this year and over the next five? To continue to grow, we are constantly evolving our Health and Nutrition, Alternative Proteins, and sustainable sourcing even more deeply and are making great progress. By partnering with others, we can knowledge share our expertise and expand into new areas, and this may mean start-ups with great ideas as well as more established entities. Overall, it’s been a tough year initially, but business has bounced back to to 2019 top-line levels after a tough first half of 2021. We’ve also extended our purpose driven strategy to 2030 with ambitious goals to ensure the entire business will be net zero and a superior example of sustainable best practice. What is novel about Griffith Foods as a food service provider? At our heart we are still a family business, one that acts and functions like a family whilst behaving as owners. I think our value system is very strong as we are true collaborators who take in customers, always as family. It’s one reason we have great retention rates. We always innovate, inspire and collaborate to create products and concepts that drive customer success, and we remain keen to have early conversations with customers so that needs are understood and aspirations delivered. One of our other key differentiators is our mission to be more sustainable in all our decisions and actions. People, Planet and Performance make up the pillars of 10 food Marketing & Technology • February 2022
Ingredients Registration opens March 1 July 10–13, 2022 McCormick Place | Chicago, IL Reconnect Learn Innovate Stay connected with the latest IFT FIRST updates at iftevent.org. Key No. 102109 food Marketing & Technology • February 2022 11
