Elior India expands its reach in the country

Elior India expands its reach in the country

Hyderabad: Elior India, part of France-based contracted food and support services provider Elior Group, is expanding its footprint in the country by building centralised kitchens and tying up with multinational corporates as well as large Indian business conglomerates. Elior today has nine centralised kitchens across India, including one at HITEC City in Hyderabad.

Bengaluru-based company has established its operations in Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi besides tier-2 cities such as Bhopal, Nellore, Pondicherry, Kozikode and Amaravathi. Elior marked its entry into India in 2017, with the simultaneous acquisitions of MegaBite Food Services (100 per cent) and C Ramachandran Catering Ltd (70 per cent), two Indian contract caterers for the business and industry market.

Sanjay Kumar, MD, Elior India, told Telangana Today, “We have today emerged as the India’s largest player serving close to two lakh meals a day. Nationally, we have around 100 clients. We are transforming the market to help our clients to see value proposition in ‘food at work’ by enhancing the quality of their food service offer to their employees. We expect Hyderabad would contribute about 5-6 per cent in the coming 1-2 years. Among the metros, Hyderabad has better infrastructure, and we are very bullish on our growth here.”

On the infrastructure front, Elior has two kitchens in Chennai, three in Bengaluru, one each in Hyderabad, Sri City (AP), Delhi and Mumbai. The company will add one centralized kitchen each in Delhi and Mumbai soon. It sees potential to add the second kitchen in Hyderabad as well. The company plans to take its kitchens from nine to 13 in India in the next few years. It will foray into Gujarat and Rajasthan where it does not have presence at present.

Digitisation
Elior introduced digitisation through the entire food production chain including Menu Management System, an automation which helps craft over 2,400 menu combinations tailored to suit the varying needs of its clients keeping in mind their specific food preferences and taste sensitivities. Elior India has also developed an in-house app-El Chef designed to provide convenience to corporate employees for choosing and paying for meals from the comfort of their desks.

The company also makes inventory management accordingly, while serving clients in the IT industry where employees work in shifts and the numbers are dynamic. He says, in the last 3-4 years, food pricing has seen a lot of change in India moving from Rs 60 per meal mindset to companies that are willing to pay Rs 650 per meal for quality food for their employees.

“The food service industry is estimated to have touched $78 billion in 2018 and the contract catering market in India is valued at $6.8 billion, growing at a CAGR of 15 per cent. This is one of the highest in the world. Though the growth rate has been significant, a large market in India still remains untapped. The market is fragmented with more than two million organised caterers. We see a huge opportunity in India,” he informed.

The article was published on telanganatoday.com on June 20th, 2019