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Abbey National |
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Background
In 2002 The Abbey National Group decided to tackle the cost
of providing catering and vended services to their 12,000
employees at the 18 Head Office
locations throughout the UK.
Covista, the strategic facilities management company jointly
setup by Abbey National and Stiell Facilities Limited to
manage and add value to all Abbey National’s non-core
activities, decided to engage the
support of a catering specialist and in March 2002 appointed
Catering Business Solutions (CBS). |
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The Challenge
To eliminate the catering subsidy and make substantial savings on
vending costs making sure that Abbey National employees saw
improvements and not reductions in the service provided. Many of
the
locations had old facilities and required
refurbishing. Most of the 800 existing
vending machines needed to be replaced.
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The
Solution
“As Abbey National was reasonably satisfied overall with the
service provided by their current suppliers there was no
point in changing for change sake. What we needed to do was
work closely with Covista and the contractors to help them
identify areas for increasing efficiency,” commented Arthur
Meakin at CBS.
To ensure that the work was completed in the shortest
possible timescale CBS implemented their bespoke ‘Single
Company Tender System’ looking to achieve the solution in 2
phases. Initially to reduce the catering subsidy by 40% and
then to achieve nil subsidy within 12 months. To address
the vending issue, work was undertaken to
establish the most
cost effective solution. |
Arthur Meakin
of CBS |
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The Results
By the end of June 2003 The Abbey National Group had saved over 40%
on the previous year’s operating subsidy with the same tariff, no
service changes and improved quality as a result of the work
undertaken by Covista and CBS. The nil subsidy will start in July
2003 and will include an £800k investment in new
facilities and a new branded service. The new vending service
started on the 1st March 2003 and over a 6 week period all old
machines were replaced with new. The overall
cost of providing the
service has been reduced by almost 50%. Finally The Abbey National
Group now has a new flexible agreement which enables them to
downsize without penalty and also get a royalty payback on canned
drink sales.
“The project has been a complete success,” said Fraser
Campbell, Deputy MD at Covista. |
