Local Food Links is a social enterprise that provides healthy cooked meals that are made with locally-sourced ingredients to school children at over fifty sites in Dorset. It is a rapidly growing business that is increasingly winning school catering contracts against established corporate providers through the provision of higher-quality meals.
LFL approached us in 2019, asking for assistance in replacing their existing bespoke ERP and e-commerce application. Our role was to guide LFL in defining their requirements, then find a solution that could fit in their budget, be delivered before the start of the next academic year and provide a strong base for future growth and innovation.
Over a series of workshops with staff, customers and parents, we created a requirements matrix that helped identify and prioritise features of the new system. After surveying the market for off-the-shelf solutions, we recommended finding a tech partner that LFL could work with to produce a new bespoke system.
We then managed the RFP process, creating a vendor pack and and assessing responses from competing suppliers from commercial, technical and strategic perspectives. Our recommendation was to work with SimpleWeb, a digital agency with strong credentials and previous experience in the catering sector.
Over 6 months, we helped manage the development and delivery of the new mobile-friendly application, working with LFL and SimpleWeb to keep priorities, technology and spend aligned. Despite the challenges of 2020, the system went live at the start of the academic year in September.
Visit Local Food Links to learn more.