About

I am a food professional with 22 years’ experience in key positions with leading Irish food firms such as Kerry Foods, Green Isle Foods, Aryzta Food Solutions and Kepak Convenience Foods; and 8 years’ experience in mentoring micro, small and medium sized businesses. I have end to end experience across disciplines including R&D, Lean Manufacturing and Cost Reduction, Upscaling, Technical Management, Purchasing, Negotiation and Supplier Management, Training and Development; and General Management. With qualifications in Human Nutrition, Accounting and Finance, Quality Control Management, Negotiation Skills, Food Hygiene Management, Food Standards Auditing, HACCP System Design and Implementation, Lean Manufacturing Six Sigma and Training and Development; I has a proven track record of bringing a detailed end to end understanding and intrepid and innovative approach to bear on complex and challenging projects and opportunities.

What People Say

Why Us? Seeing the Bigger Picture

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It’s a slightly abused cliché that everything is connected to everything else; but it’s nevertheless so true. It’s too easy to go down a rabbit hole in pursuit of an improvement agenda:

Development that builds in food safety and lean manufacturing that delivers accurately against a cost model is where you need to be; and that is exactly what we’re about.. keeping an eye on the bigger picture regardless of how small or how focussed a project is.

We’re solidly qualified and experienced in all of the areas we work in but our strength is being able to take the considered, knowledgeable, wider view, based on experience; and advise and execute accordingly.

“The whole is greater than the sum of the parts”

Aristotle

What values are important to me as a Prepared Food and Drink Industry Consultant?

• Personal Attention: I look after every client project personally and I only take on what I’m able to handle.
• Going above and beyond: I roll up our sleeves and get involved. I engage with your team to get to the root of the problem or opportunity; putting together an action plan with your team to achieve the desired goal. I will be with you all the way.
• Clear and Unambiguous Goals: I set agreed goals with the client at the beginning of a project or a piece of work to ensure that the client achieves something meaningful to them even from a one day engagement.
• Intrepid and Innovative. Nothing fazes me. I have a track record of bringing my detailed understanding and intrepid and innovative approach to bear on complex and challenging projects.
• Honest and Straighforward. I regard my clients too highly to tell them what they want to hear; instead of what they need to hear. I’m about getting to the nub of the matter as directly as possible.
• Being courteous and professional. The most difficult situations can be unpicked with professionalism and the most difficult messages can be delivered with courtesy. I believe in both.
• Value for Money. You’ll get timely progress and focussed goal achievement. I’m adept at understanding which costs in a client’s business adds value and which does not.
• Making the end product king. In the food manufacturing, retailing and consumer environment, the root or foundation of every successful and profitable food business is the product being offered for sale and consumption; after all; there are few things more personal than what we choose to eat and drink….
• I don’t believe in magic wands! For positive change to be lasting, my involvement will have an educational character as we prefer to work with and through your people so that change is staff led, cultural and not only lasting but organic, positive change continuing after the project has ended.

The Top Ten Ways in which I am most frequently able to help clients

1. Designing a more cost effective way to produce the client’s end product. This can be about making more product in the same time with the same facilities; delaying the need to hire more staff or move premises; or; upscaling to higher capacity using more efficient methods and lean techniques to reduce cost of manufacture per item significantly.
2. Using predictive modelling starting with creation of current baseline to explore cost of manufacturing options to create confidence about reduction in cost of goods including ingredients, components, packaging, labour, manufacturing overhead and supply chain that can be expected from different manufacturing models, equipment options and from upscaling as volume grows according to forecast scenarios.
3. Creating raw material input savings through tendering processes, product re-design and negotiation with current suppliers. Remember, ceteris paribus, in a business making 6% nett; a 2% inputs saving is equivalent to a 33% growth in sales.
4. Running an Outsourcing Process for clients when it doesn’t make sense for them to invest to produce the product themselves.
5. Finding problems and fixing them before your customers do. Risk Assessing client’s current process using HACCP related techniques and internal auditing. I never move on any project without understanding food safety first.
6. Validating Product Shelf Life
7. Designing and Implementing HACCP Plans
8. Designing and costing food safe production process with lean manufacturing built in.
9. Designing and tendering out equipment. Choosing equipment that is easy and safe to live with, efficient and hygienic.
10. Guiding or actually doing an R&D / NPD process / project for a client.