We look at the journey a family firm began just under two decades ago that took its turnover of £29 million to four times that and staff numbers to 450. It's a business that’s just been sold for £70m.

This week our blog comes from guest writer Andrew Merrell, founder and lead journalist of The Raikes Journal who first published this article in The Raikes Journal on 17th October 2024.

A month-ish ago we were about to write a story about Gloucestershire legend Creed Foodservice’s just-published outstanding annual results for our rolling Top 100 series, our collection of stories that follows the financial fortunes of the county’s biggest firms (see our Reports & Deals channel).

And then its CEO, Chris Creed, suggested we hold fire. Only afterwards did it become apparent why. News broke that the business had sold.

What had initially struck us most of all about its financial results was not the astonishing growth in turnover, which we’ll come to shortly, but the reasons behind that growth.

And so, rather than just walk away from the story we wanted to try to make something of it, not just to pay tribute and point to the achievements of Creed Foodservice, but to try to lay bare some of that magic formula that took it to where it is. Who knows, it could work for others too!

It’s a formula that appears to echo a little of the increasingly popular B Corp movement and its mantra of ‘people, planet, profit’, which as counterintuitive as it sounds to split your energies away from the bottom-line converts will tell you boosts it too.

Creed Foodservice did it slightly differently, but it became obsessed with its culture and looking after its people. It no doubt cost it more, but it was convinced this was its ticket to growth. And so it has proved.

And although in recent times it has won accolades from the likes of The Sunday Times and featured on its Best Companies To Work For list - voted for by staff - it was its senior teams that it concentrated on to start with.

But first, who better to introduce you to the business than Chris himself, the man who did not just start that culture change, he tested the formula on himself first!

“We are one of the UK’s leading independent family-owned foodservice wholesalers specialising in providing a comprehensive range of multi temperature products to a range of customers within the leisure, hospitality, education and care sectors,” said Chris, writing in the firm’s recently published annual report.

“Our business is built on family values and trust, recognising the importance of open, honest and supportive relationships that work for everyone.

“Our brand message #BeleveInMore not only reflects company-wide culture to go the extra mile for our customers, but it’s also our aspiration to continually improve our industry leading service levels.

“This year, our 51st birthday, the business achieved another record year in turnover of £124 million and were again recognised by ‘best companies’ as being one of the UK’s 100 best large companies to work for, at position 55 (that’s The Sunday Times list).

“The results for 2023 demonstrate the resilience of the business.”

Operating profit was £8 million.

“The business has again responded well to the ongoing challenge of inflation and in particular food inflation together with significant energy increases, while continuing to invest in its infrastructure, its people and be a Living Wage Foundation employer.”

You can get the message. It’s business as you know it, but everything is linked somehow to its values, its determination to walk the walk it talks.

It’s a management culture where each person takes responsibility to set the best example they can, to support and work together and to pick one another up on it if they don’t.

“It’s not easy. You have to keep working on it. You have to pick one another up on behaviour, reinforce what we stand for all the time. It is hard, it can be challenging, but it works,” said Martin Holmes, the firm’s people director, at a recent B Corp event staged by QuoLux, as the only non-B Corp speaker.

Philip de Ternant, chairman of Creed Foodservice, said: “Culture change has a massive impact on the business. We’ve simplified our values, which are ‘commercial, friendly, nurturing and proud’.

“The leaders have to drive it. I have to demonstrate it all the time and so does my senior team – otherwise it’s just a joke. It wouldn’t mean anything.

“Sometimes that’s inconvenient, to be honest. It takes thought and time and it’s easier to take shortcuts when you’re busy. But you’ve got to do things properly.

“What does it say to everyone else if they think we’re not demonstrating the things we say are most valued by the business?”

The annual report outlines those other things you’d expect to see too. There was investment too in vehicles, IT and e-commerce infrastructure and a continual focus on cyber security.

Read far enough into the report and there is also mention of £77,000 in cash and products it donated to local charities - as well as encouraging and allowing its staff to be involved in charitable causes during the working week.

You won’t find much of that on social media. Which makes you come to the conclusion public profile wasn’t a priority.

Someone who did take note of all the detail was North Shields-based Kitwave Wholesale Group. It liked Creed Foodservice so much it’s just bought the Staverton headquartered firm for £70 million, announcing the deal in September.

For anyone who might need even more proof that the Creed Foodservice formula worked and also made it possible for its owners and shareholders to also capitalise on a lifetime’s work - knowing also that the new owner has no plans to change what they’ve built - the deal sounds like a win-win.

We turned to Dr Stewart Barnes of QuoLux for a little insight into the methods of Creed Foodservice, and with good reason. His business, a specialist in leadership development, was there at the very start of it all and has been there ever since.

“When we first started working with Creed in 2011 it had a turnover of £29 million and 221 staff. We like to think we helped them create a vision of the future, which at the time was a business with a turnover of £100 million,” he said.

“There is a culture of change that is clearly evident in the company. It perfectly understands its sector and has delivered massive growth year on year.”

Not that Barnes is taking credit for Chris’s achievements – just proud to have played a part and to work with the firm all the way through.

“What Chris has done is fantastic,” said Barnes.

But he will tell you that figures show that a shockingly low number of UK businesses invest in developing their leadership teams and culture, and that the percentage of those do embrace the change is fairly static.

Saying that, QuoLux has now worked with an estimated 200-plus businesses and almost 1,000 business leaders, UK-wide and internationally too.

Barnes’ frustration that there are not more is because he can also point to figures that show those who invest in their leadership teams see turnover increase over and above those that don’t – and continue to. Just Google it.

When Creed Foodservice’s culture change story began way back in 2007 B Corp was only in its infancy (it was founded in 2006), not even on the radar, but it was then that that Chris revealed the answer to a conundrum facing many family firms.

That challenge was how to maintain a strong family presence and place for family members in a business that also required non-family members to rise through the ranks if it was to truly thrive.

He addressed the issues of growth and succession within the firm by employing a team of non-family senior executives, creating a family board and an executive board.

It allowed him, together with the non-family executive directors, to run the company and meet the shareholders on the family board quarterly to discuss progress.

“This game changing structure allowed Chris to nurture a professional team within a pre-existing family hierarchy enabling non-family members to have real power in the company, thereby resolving an issue that is identified as a major stumbling block in the growth of family businesses,” said Barnes.

 

One of the Cohort 1 groups in their How-To review session

 

At the same time the business was also investing, most notably in a purpose-built distribution centre in Derbyshire to maintain our industry-leading customer service, in line with our growth.

But it was also investing in something that would trigger a whole change of approach this article is all about. It was also investing in their own leadership skills.

In 2012 Chris graduated from QuoLux’s 10-month long leadership and business growth program, LEAD™, integrating much of his learning into Creed Foodservice, including business planning, employee engagement and the introduction of a lean team.

It was foundation block for the firm it is today. All of the three other Creed brothers Steve, Phil and Paul, were soon following suit on the programme and that led to positions as executive and non-executive positions on the firm’s board.

Sales and marketing director Miles Roberts also went through the programme before succeeding Philip in January this year. It had become a right of passage. More staff are currently working their way through the QuoLux route right now.

LEAD™ has become a rite of passage with the 16th senior person joining the programme this month, and almost 80 colleagues are undertaking a 2-year bespoke leadership programme using the QuoLux How-To range.

It was about creating that culture Holmes earlier referred to as “challenging” but “something that works”.

When the sale was announced Chris had this to say: “Creed’s ethos and business approach remain at the heart of our operations.

“Creed has thrived on family values for over 50 years and our people, culture and values remain woven into the fabric of our extended business.

“This move strengthens our position within the market, offering the best possible outcome for our business, people and customers.”

Barnes said: “If you are in any doubt about the value of culture you can look at the sale of Creed Foodservice.

“Not only has it got an extremely high multiple for the business, the company that has acquired them is putting its own food service division under Creed Foodservice.

It is an amazing deal and it underlines the quality of the leadership team they created at Creed.”

To learn more about our leadership and business development program, LEAD™, and how it could help your organisation, please get in touch with Rachael Ramos here. Our next LEAD™ program starts in April 2025.

 

 

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