Contract catering giant Compass, the number one in the UK with a turnover of around £3.1b, has bought Facilities Management Catering (FMC), the official caterer at the Wimbledon tennis championships.
The lucrative contract involves running two waitress-service restaurants as well as numerous cafés, bars and kiosks. The deal comes at an acquisitive time for Compass, which has recently announced that it has a £200m budget for purchases during the current financial year.
FMC, which has an annual turnover of £12m and profits of about £416,000, was set up by Frank McCartney, previously managing director of event caterer Town & County, a division of Sodexho. FMC won the Wimbledon contract in 1999 after it had been run for 50 years by Town & County.
Some 1,500 staff are employed during Wimbledon fortnight, when about 80,000 glasses of Pimm's and two million strawberries are sold to tennis lovers. This year's tournament starts on Monday 23 June.
FMC also operates contracts at the National Motor Museum, Marwell Zoo and Southampton Football Club, all in Hampshire; the Royal Horticultural Society Garden Harlow Carr, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, and Kingston Communications Stadium, Hull.
Compass is expected to deliver its promised 6% like-for-like growth in turnover at its interim results next week. The company has just renewed its £25m-a-year contract with British Telecom for a further seven years - one of the biggest contract catering deals in the UK.
By Ben Walker