If I could give you the clearest of snapshots into the turbulent year Spoonfed has been through it would be summed up by comparing June 2020 with May 2021.

June 2020: As a leading SaaS for the catering industry Spoonfed saw its revenue dive as our users' orders dried up overnight. A painful time for us, and a nightmare for the global FSM companies, Universities, local Caterers and those working for Restaurant Chains who had logged into our back office each day to manage their catering programs. No more face to face meetings = no catering requirements and that was that. Ouch.

May 2021 is a different story. Even though I had a handle on how busy our sales team were I still double checked the figures when I realised that we were looking at our busiest opportunities ‘pipeline’ ever. Quite a turnaround by any standards. Our implementation team is now powering through their busiest period to onboard these new clients.

What happened?

From Spoonfed’s point of view the key moment was back in mid 2020 when the decision was made to recruit more staff when we were at our lowest ebb. Increasing our development team, as a result of welcome pandemic support through the Scottish Enterprise Challenge Fund scheme, we were able to do all we could to be sure that we stayed ahead of the curve as we exit the pandemic crisis.

Our focus throughout this time has been on where we want to be and on developing new features and additional business use-cases. Some have been released and there’s more to follow. No doubt that what we are now experiencing can be traced back to that decision to develop in a way that recognised that there would be a different landscape ahead for caterers.

Of course there are still a few hurdles to go over. Whilst re-opening in the US is progressing at pace, and momentum is building, the UK hospitality sector is still not in ‘Get Go’ mode but encouragingly there are clear signs, especially amongst larger B&I organizations and the Further Education sector that ‘times are a changin’.

In both the US and the UK it’s been especially interesting (and incredibly encouraging!) to see a number of Universities and Colleges approaching Spoonfed as they seek to be on the front foot for students returning. The decision to grow our development team has been vindicated, it is the options we are giving these catering teams to thrive in what they are already doing, alongside increasing their reach with alternative catering models, which is really paying off. For everyone.

We have spent a lot of time making sure we are ready. Are you?

Get in touch by asking for a demo. Speaking to one of the team will let you see how Spoonfed can help you get ready.