Compass Group reports strong results

Compass Group, the world's largest caterer, has delivered a strong third-quarter performance despite fears over the global economy and rampant food price inflation.

Compass refused to join economic doom-mongers yesterday and instead reiterated its comments made in May that it remained confident about its future performance.

The company delivered organic turnover growth in all its major territories bar the UK, where turnover and profit growth remained in-line with 2007 as action to simplify the UK business structure continues.

"We are continuing to see good progress in mitigating the impact of input cost increases through the delivery of efficiency savings including menu planning and staff scheduling and we are increasing our focus on unit overheads in the same way as on food and staff costs," Compass said in a statement.

For more on managing food costs see our dedicated food inflation page on Caterersearch.

In May, Compass announced a tie-up between its fine-dining division Restaurant Associates and Gordon Ramsay Holdings, to be called Gordon Ramsay at Restaurant Associates.

Caterer Elior threatened with legal action over school dinners contract >>

Compass Group renews multimillion-pound deal with Abbey >>

Executive pay continues to soar despite economic slowdown >>

Compass event caterer Leith's wins castle deal >>

Compass Group confident about future performance >>

Gordon Ramsay teams up with Restaurant Associates >>

By Chris Druce

E-mail your comments to Chris Druce here.