FOI release

Procurement of Ambient, Chilled and Frozen Food Products by the Council

Case reference FOI2026/00216

Received 28 January 2026

Published 11 February 2026

Request

Reference: Freedom of Information Act Request-Procurement of Ambient, Chilled and Frozen Food Products by the Council

I am conducting research into the various procurement approaches that Councils within England use to procure Food products (Ambient, Chilled & Frozen) for supply and distribution to local authority premises, schools, libraries etc. that are served by their Council.

Under this Freedom of Information Act Request, I would be most grateful if you would confirm the following:

Part 1

1. Which of the following procurement routes the Council chose to procure its current Food supply requirements:

a) Direct Award Contract-i.e. the Council ran its own procurement , involving the development of Council-specific Food supply and delivery specifications, management of the tender process and award of a Contract to the successful bidder(s).

b) Mini-Competition under a Framework Agreement-i.e. the Council selected a relevant Framework Agreement and ran a Mini-Competition (involving the development of Council-specific food supply and delivery requirements), managed the mini-competition process and awarded business to a supplier(s) under the Framework Agreement.

c) Direct Award under a Framework Agreement-i.e. the Council selected a relevant Framework Agreement and directly awarded business to a supplier(s) under the Framework Agreement, without running a further competition process.

d) Part of another local Authority's tender process - i.e. the Council's requirements were included within a multi-Council run procurement.

2. Details of the current Contract:

a) Scope: Ambient Food, Chilled and/or Frozen Food

b) Contract Period: How long (months) and scope for extension (months)

c) Contract Value: Over the length of the Contract

d) Contract Expiry Date: Date

e) Current Supplier(s) Details: Organisation Name(s)

3. Where the current contract expires in 2026, which procurement route(s) the Council is considering or intends to use.

4. Which department within the Council is responsible for the performance management of the current contract.

5. Which department within the Council is/will be responsible for the re-procurement of the food supply service.

Part 2

1. Schedule of the products delivered to your organisation, including monthly/annual volumes where applicable

2. Details of any specific product manufacturers/suppliers/wholesalers required to be used as part of service delivery

3. Frequency of deliveries, endpoint locations and details of any specific packaging/transportation requirements (cages etc.).

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To assist with the data return process, I have attached a spreadsheet with the relevant questions and options pre-populated: I would be most grateful if you would complete the spreadsheet and return it to me.

Part 1 Questions 1-2 are "standard" pieces of information published in a Contract Award Notice, as required by the Cabinet Office.

Part 2 information can be supplied without pricing information, if this would conflict with the Council's policy on Commercially Sensitive Information under its FoIA implementation. Part 2 information will have been provided by the Council in the form of a service specification and tender pricing schedules to bidders - if the cost of extracting this information is likely to exceed the Council's budget for processing this FoI request, I would be happy to receive electronic copies of the relevant tender documents and will undertake the data extraction myself.

If your Council ran separate procurements for Ambient, Chilled and/or Frozen Food, I would be most grateful if you would complete answers to the above questions for each procurement - the spreadsheet has separate tabs for the different generic food service categories.

Response