Under new management
Sodexho goes public
Sodexho's hotels and commercial restaurants division has been hired to revamp and run retailer Bentalls' eight customer and two staff restaurants in six locations. The five-year contract, worth £3.5m a year, is the division's first stab at running public restaurants.
Civil food service
Sodexho Scotland has won a five-year contract to cater for the Scottish Executive's 4,000 civil servants. The deal is worth £8m over five years, and brings the group's annual turnover in Scotland to £60m.
Compass fast food
Compass Group has scooped a five-year contract worth a total of £8m in turnover to handle corporate hospitality and events at the new £46m Rockingham Motor Speedway in Corby, Northamptonshire.
Feeling blue
Sheffield Galleries and Museums Trust has selected Hudson Rowe to operate the 120-seat Café Azure in the £15m Millennium Galleries, which opens in Sheffield on 5 April. Annually, the seven-year contract is worth £500,000.
Flagship launches
Yates's opens its flagship bar in London's Leicester Square on 17 April. The £1.25m pub, which will hold 700 people, will introduce a new cocktail menu and training package, which will be extended to Yates's 125 other branches.
La Tasca goes south
Spanish tapas bar chain La Tasca has opened its 14th restaurant, at Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth harbour. The 180-seat restaurant supplants those in Bristol and London as the group's most southerly branch.
