In 1987 a woman named Leyla Edwards founded a food company from her own kitchen, built on the idea of providing delicious, home-cooked food. That business grew to become KK Fine Foods.
“When you’ve got someone like Leyla, who’s an incredibly passionate person, it affects the entire outlook of the business,” said Samir Edwards, Channel Director for Industry & Foodservice of the company when we spoke to him in 2020.
Of course, since 2020 a great deal has happened. We have seen the Covid pandemic, the war in Ukraine, and a widespread cost-of-living crisis.
“It has been tough for the whole business, our supply chain, our sales team, and our customers,” admits Sally Anglesea, Marketing Manager at the firm, when we meet her now. “But we have overcome these challenges and continue to do so through the strong relationships we have across our supply chain, logistics providers and customers.”
It has also been a time of transformation for the company formerly known as KK Fine Foods. When we come to speak to revisit the company, it is now known as What’s Cooking? Deeside UK, part of the international What’s Cooking Group.
“We have all embraced that change of identity,” Anglesea says. “Of course, that has brought its own challenges. As a company established in 1987, we have a loyal customer base and a reputation we have built over many years.”
The priority during this transition has been to preserve the relationships that have carried KK Fine Foods this far.
“It can be jarring when there is a name change, and there can be a fear with rebranding that a company’s principles and ethos might change too,” Anglesea points out. “Customers trust in us and our quality, so we have managed to assure our customers that the only things that will change are our name and branding. Our high-quality” What has not changed is that What’s Cooking Deeside UK specialises in quality frozen food.
Greening Your Eats
Worldwide issues over the last few years have hugely disrupted the huge industry as a whole, and it has taken effort and focus to overcome those challenges.
The company’s new identity is, in part, an effort to address those challenges.
“We wanted to refresh our image and importantly we wanted to do that with sustainability in the spotlight,” Anglesea points out. “Our colour palette is very green. We want it to reflect our mission to work as a sustainable business.”
To unite it under a single company brand, the parent company adopted the What’s Cooking? brand, and as a collective the international Group is working towards one mission of sustainability and quality food across all territories and products.
“We want to keep sustainability and innovation at the heart of what we do,” Anglesea explains. “Health of self and health of planet are closely connected – and awareness of both is more prevalent now than ever before. As a company, we want to champion the health of the world we live in, in the hope that the smaller changes we make will ultimately help to impact bigger ones.”
This push for sustainability includes the reduction of single-use plastics across the business, while increasingly drawing on recycled materials. The company is reducing internal waste and working with charities to achieve its goals. The company also has high standards of animal welfare for the pieces of meats What’s Cooking? buys for its tasty savoury and ready meal products. But at the same time, it is introducing plant-based alternatives.
“The overall objective for the What’s Cooking Group is to become 15% plant-based, but here at Deeside we are already at that level,” Anglesea says. “‘We are proud to produce an innovative array of both vegan and vegetarian dishes that appeal to a broad audience.”
It is an attitude reflected in What’s Cooking?’s motto, “Day by day, Cooking up a better world.”
“That highlights what we are trying to do here,” Anglesea says.
A New Kind of Dining
A heightened awareness of health and sustainability is only one of the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“The industry has been significantly affected by our lack of human interaction,” Anglesea tells us. “We were forced into isolation, and there are two sides to that. One side is practical- during COVID-19, QR code ordering was introduced because it had to be. It was the route the industry found to function while staff were unable to physically engage with customers.”
It was a tool that was quickly and enthusiastically adopted by customers and staff alike.
“It’s a style of ordering and eating people really enjoy,” Anglesea points out. “It has been translated to food halls where you find so many different cuisines and everyone can order something different on their phone, with no splitting the bill. If you go to a food hall with your friends and one is adventurous and another is picky, there is something for everyone.”
There is more to it than that, however. After a year of isolation, people are hungry for more than food.
“There is a desire to be socially connected, with a different approach to what that looks like,” says Anglesea.
Meeting that hunger for social connection and high-quality food is What’s Cooking?’s ongoing mission.
“Here at the Deeside subsidiary, we are committed to producing high-quality luxury ready meals and more,” Anglesea says. “Innovation is at the heart of what we do. We are working closely with our customers to create dishes and elevate menus in ways that complement our brand and are tailored towards our target customers.”
Anglesea herself has overseen the company’s marketing department as it has worked to stay connected with food trends and consumer behaviour, staying connected with the world around it. But in the food industry, there has always been a line to walk.
“You have familiar comforts that will always remain popular- those nostalgic foodie favourites will always be features on core menus,” says Anglesea. “But you also need the trends, what is exciting, what is new. World flavours and new styles of eating. Social and experiential eating are hugely popular right now.”
In our conversation, we have learned how What’s Cooking? is operating in a challenging, volatile, but exciting market.
“There is never a dull day at What’s Cooking Deeside UK,” Anglesea says. “Food is a conversation-starter; it connects us and is often the focus point for social occasions and events. I’m proud to work somewhere that champions this and uses it as a platform to support the health of our planet, through sustainable sourcing, plastic reduction and reduced meat consumption. The foodie future looks bright here at What’s Cooking? – and certainly very green!”
