SAFFRON SYSTEM HELPS DARLINGTON PUT 3% ON THE BOTTOMLINE

May 2003

The move to Saffron was a natural progression for Darlington Borough Councils Leisure and Arts Division. They had been using Fretwell-Downing Hospitalitys ProVISION product since 1998, but were looking for an upgrade. The Divisions responsibilities had grown to include civic catering in situations as diverse as golf clubs, theatres and art centres, as well as 35 school meals operations, together accounting for turnover in excess of £2.5million.

Cost saving was the main reason for the switch. Assistant Director of the Leisure and Arts Division Steve Thompson explains: "We purchase in excess of £1million-worth of food every year and we need vigorously to monitor prices over a vast range of products. By upgrading to Saffron, we were able to improve our procurement procedures; introduce tighter controls over the products being purchased, and develop audit trails to track the volumes going through our business."

Tighter controls have had a significant impact on the bottom line. "A large number of units are committed to buying from our standard list and for the most part, it works well. However, we now use individual product line codes and the Saffron system flags up where a unit is buying off list. We have the chance to rectify the situation and this has been reflected in the gross profit margins. Overall, we have improved our GP by 3% since Saffron came on stream."

The team aims to give individual unit managers access to data and is rolling out PCs to the units, beginning with the civic sites. "This will mean managers can access prices for costing purposes whenever they need them and because we will all be working from the same database, the food costs throughout the estate should clearly reflect current market prices."

It was also important that the new system should marry up with the Councils existing IT infra-structure. Saffron has proved a good match, in particular, linking with the general ledger for invoice payment.

Steve is very pleased with Saffron and the company that supplied it. "One of Fretwell-Downing Hospitalitys great strengths as a company is that it has turned our feedback into real development," he says.

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