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Food Professionals and Social Networking Survey –

Results 5 April 2011

Background:

Poll was sent to over 200 hand – picked Food Manufacturing Professionals, ranging from Managing Directors of food manufacturing companies, UK grocery retailers, interims on assignment and other likeminded people working in the sector.             Put simply, we wanted to ascertain usage of social networking media amongst food manufacturing professionals in order that we may better meet the needs of our clients and candidates.  We had a higher than usual response, with around 45% completing it.

 

Click on the link above to see the outcome - I have put my own random thoughts underneath each result, you may like to email me yours

 

Hutchinson Interim on TOP OF THE WORLD

Here is Kim Milway, one of our interim managers on the summit of Kilimanjaro We were one of the sponsors of Kim for his epic climb in aid of The Prostate Cancer Charity & to assist children and charities in Polio affected countries.  We said we'd give him a bit more if he took our logo up there and we have happily paid up. If you want us to consider your charity, you know where we are!

 

Science Student Wins Hutchinson Award 2010

 

 

The annual Hutchinson Jonas Award for excellence in industry has gone to outstanding placement student, Helen Corcoran. The award is in recognition of her achievements during a one year industrial placement at Tesco.

Helen, 21, is a Food Science student at the University of Reading and spent her year in a very “hands on” capacity including taking part in PIU audits and working on Quality and Tasting Panels.

 

The award, now in it’s third year, was presented by Scott Hutchinson group MD, Hutchinson Jonas and Adam Evans, Head of Interim Operations, Hutchinson Consultancy at an informal lunch held at the University.

Scott Hutchinson said “ I wanted to show that a recruitment company was trying to help reward talented people at the very grass-roots of the industry.  As a company, we have benefitted enormously from the food sector and feel it is important to get involved and put something back, anything we can do to help make food an interesting career choice can only be a good thing”.

The UK food and drink industry is one of the most competitive manufacturing sectors in the world, with an annual turnover of £77.4 billion and employing over 500,000 people.  Yet it has suffered from falling numbers of top graduates coming into the market.

The course at Reading is a leading example of a vocational course that is succeeding in filling the skills gap in the food industry.  The students gain valuable experience that often leads directly onto a job.  The £500 Hutchinson Jonas Award is an incentive to excel while on placement.

Professor Michael Gordon, Director of Teaching & Learning at the University, said “The opportunity to undertake an industrial placement is an important component of the BSc degrees.  The students benefit strongly from an understanding of the challenges facing the food industry, and the problem solving that they are faced with allows them to develop skills that complement their academic studies in the University”. He continued  “We are very grateful to Scott for this award and continuing sponsor of it in these difficult times.   I can speak for Helen and all the team here in Food Science at Reading University and heartily thank Scott again for his generosity”

Helen enjoyed her placement immensely and especially enjoyed the visits to    Tesco suppliers.  She singled out a visit to a primal processing plant in East  Anglia as one of the highlights, together with work conducted with grocery and non grocery suppliers.  Helen said “I found my time at Tesco a great confidence booster.  Prior to the placement, I had no idea about how a huge retailer worked, but I now feel I have a really good understanding of how the relationship between the retailer and the supplier works.  I spoke to so many people, it was an amazing year”.

Helen follows in the footsteps of last year’s winner, Laura Coyle who also spent her year at Tesco and the inaugural winner, Stacy Griffin whose placement was at Bakkavor.

 

Hutchinson Survey: Recession in the food industry

It’s hard to put a positive slant on the recession, but we have to accept that there are going to be winners and losers. For example, some food companies are going to the wall and the products they used to supply are being picked up by other companies. In the last recession, grocery food purchases actually rose by 0.2%.

We conducted a survey to find out how our clients are feeling and the results make interesting reading. It paints a positive picture of a confident industry that is not just surviving the recession, but performing well and predicting growth for the forthcoming months.

For a complete summary of the survey results, click here

 

Hutchinson runs the Bath Half 2009 for PROPS

On Sunday 15th March Scott will be running the Bath Half Marathon and will be aiming to not just complete it in "under two", but to raise money for PROPS at the same time.  

PROPS is one of the only charities in the Bristol area to offer support to children and young adults with severe special needs. It is run by a team of volunteers who organise a range of educational and sporting activities for the children and young adults.

Using facilities in a mainstream school, PROPS is run by volunteers and survives on donations to fund special facilities for the children.

There is a group of 10 unning from the Hutchinson Jonas Group and we are all aiming to raise the small sum of just  £200 each - an achievable sum, we hope. 

This money will go straight into the charity - they don't have big flashy offices, everyone is a volunteer and the money goes straight into making the children's lives easier.  

You can help them by contributing to our Just Giving site on http://www.justgiving.com/hutchinsonjonasgroup  It's hard at the moment, financially, but there is always someone worse off, any contribution no matter how small will be gratefully received.

 

Jog on...

 

 

The Hutchinson Jonas Group has entered f or the Bat h Half Marathon which tak es place in March 2009. We'll be fundraising for our two nominated special needs charities - PROPS and the National Autistic Society.

New year's eve resolutions are hastily being made. Especially for Scott, determined to defend his PB of 1 hour 53 minutes. For more about our community work, click here.