From the Paris Olympics and the Rugby World Cup to Royal Ascot, Sodexo Live has become the invisible force keeping plates loaded and champagne glasses topped up at Europe’s biggest events. In 2023 the Paris-headquartered catering giant ‘s events division, Sodexo Live, served more than 11m guests in the UK alone, employing around 1,700 people across the country to keep its operations running. And despite a tough couple of years that saw the Covid-19 pandemic wipe out live events, Sodexo’s London-headquartered UK arm has rebounded in spectacular fashion, reporting record turnover of £1.
4bn in the year ending August 31, 2023, up from £1.2bn in the same period of 2019, according to its most recently-filed accounts . This increase in sales has delivered a much-needed boost to the company’s recovering bottom line, with its pre-tax profit reaching £51m in its latest financial year, inching closer to the £82m it hit in the 12 months ending August 31, 2019.
But according to Claire Morris, Sodexo Live’s UK CEO, returning to its pre-pandemic profit levels is just the starting point for the company’s ambitious growth plans. “Growth is absolutely a top priority for us and it’s going to happen in two ways”, she said. “Firstly we’re out there to win new clients which is about showing them our proven track record of delivering what we say we will.
“Secondly, we’re going to focus on enhancing our services for existing clients. For example, if we’re already prov.