Food delivery firm’s £3.5m pubs deal

The three-year contract is worth around £3.5m a year to the company, which delivers frozen, chilled and ambient goods to caterers.

Holdsworth, which was founded in 1969 by current chairman Michael Holdsworth, employs 269 staff across seven depots in Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Staffordshire, Northamptonshire, Worcestershire and Powys.

“We are very pleased to have won the contract to supply to McMullen,” said Holdsworth chairman Michael Holdsworth yesterday. “Over the last 42 years we have grown to become a respected food service distributor in the UK.”

Paul Robbins, the food development manager at McMullen, said: “Holdsworth supports our vision wholeheartedly. The team is committed and experienced, and we are very pleased to be working with them over the next three years.”

The privately-owned company, which is based in Tideswell, Derbyshire, stocks around 5,000 lines, and runs a fleet of 62 multi-temperature lorries and 12 vans.

Three members of the Holdsworth family work for the business, which has grown both organically and through acquisition to reach an annual turnover of around £49m for the last financial year, a 7.4 per cent increase on the previous year.

Last year the company acquired four businesses in Derbyshire, Yorkshire and Staffordshire, including specialist catering butchers, which has increased the range and diversity of products that Holdsworth offers.

The company employs 20 staff at its depot in Halifax, West Yorkshire.

In recent years, Holdsworth has completed an investment of more than £1m on a new freezer and dry goods store at its Evesham depot and taken delivery of 26 new multi-temperature lorries.