Notes for owners · Industry playbooks
What HR heads check before hiring a corporate caterer
An HR or admin head hiring an office caterer checks the kitchen, the paperwork, the menu rotation and who answers the phone when lunch is late. Here is what to have ready.
The GullySales team · Updated 6 Oct 2026 · 5 min read
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The HR or admin head hiring a caterer is checking one thing underneath all the others: will this vendor make my phone ring? She looks at the kitchen. She asks for the licences, reads the menu, and then asks who is on site on a Monday. Have the papers in one folder, the menu rotation written, a named supervisor and a tasting ready. The caterer who arrives with those four things has answered every objection before it is raised, and usually the quote is read after that, not before.
Who is in the room
Three people decide, and they are afraid of different things.
The HR head dreads complaints that reach the leadership. The admin or facilities manager is afraid of a breakdown at noon with four hundred people waiting. The finance head wants a rate that stays put in the second month. Sometimes a founder joins at the tasting and mostly asks whether the food is the sort he would eat himself.
If your proposal speaks to only one of them, the other two will find a reason to ask for a second quote. Write one paragraph each in your reply.
What they ask to see
| What the buyer asks | What to hand over | Why it matters to them |
|---|---|---|
| "Can we see your kitchen?" | A visit slot at a working hour, not a cleaned-for-visitors hour | They want to see the process, the storage and the dishwashing area |
| "Show me your licences." | Copies of what you hold, with the name it stands in | The admin head is answerable if something goes wrong |
| "Who else do you serve?" | Two or three reference contacts who have agreed to be called | They will phone one of them |
| "What does the menu look like?" | A written rotation for the cycle you propose, with the veg and non-veg split | Repetition is the commonest complaint |
| "What if someone is allergic or on a diet?" | How you label dishes and how a request is handled | One incident reaches leadership |
| "Who is on site?" | A named supervisor and a backup, with phone numbers | Someone must be reachable at noon |
Do not claim certifications you do not hold. Food licensing and hygiene rules differ by state and body and change, so check the current position with your own adviser.
The tasting is the sale
A tasting for the four deciding people, in a meeting room, is the moment the contract is usually decided. Serve what you would serve on an ordinary Wednesday, not a banquet. Bring the actual packaging and the serving counter set-up. If you run a canteen, offer a tasting at a site you already operate, so that the HR head sees staff eating it.
Ask for written feedback from each person before they leave. It tells you what to fix before the second round, and it tells you who the real decision-maker is.
What happens in the first week decides the renewal
A company that signs a caterer watches the first week closely. Late arrival, a missing dish, a wrong head count on Tuesday: each is remembered by the person who has to explain it upstairs.
Fix the daily routine before the first plate goes out. Who confirms the head count the evening before, who receives the delivery, who signs the slip, and who the admin manager calls if lunch is late. Write it on one page. Give it to her. A caterer who has done this is, in her mind, already different from the incumbent.
For example, a caterer in an IT park near Electronics City takes over a canteen from a vendor who was changed because nobody answered calls. The new caterer posts the supervisor's number on the notice board on the first day and calls the admin manager at four in the afternoon to ask how lunch went. Nothing about the menu changed. The admin manager noticed.
Do not wait for the contract term to end
Contracts get renewed or replaced quietly. It happens when a new HR head joins or a competitor sends a cheaper quote, and nobody tells you. The caterer who is meeting the admin manager once every quarter, with the feedback sheet in hand, is rarely replaced by surprise. Keep the notes from each visit in one place, with dates and what you agreed. When the renewal discussion starts, you will have a record of what you fixed.
What to do next
List the last three proposals you sent to offices. Mark whether each included the licence copies, a written menu rotation, a named supervisor and a tasting offer. Whichever is missing, add it to your standard proposal this week, because the next enquiry will arrive before you have time to think about it.
The corporate catering page shows how the whole enquiry-to-contract path is handled, and the topic pages on lead generation and CRM go into following up a proposal that has gone quiet. If you want your own enquiry flow read, tell us what you need and we will read it before we call.
