Concessions

A Message from Edward Perry, Co-Founder:

COOK has its roots in a coffee shop, started by my parents 35 years ago. I worked there during school holidays and it didn’t take long for me to see the pressures of being an independent retailer in a world dominated by the multiples. Today COOK remains family-controlled, independent, and passionately committed to supporting other like-minded independent retailers. It’s in our DNA.

I make no apology for being fussy about who we work with and while we don’t want to make the application process overly onerous, it’s essential we know that COOK will be represented in the best possible light. We’ve put a lot of thought into the criteria below, and I’m afraid we can’t accept applications that do not meet them all. So please consider each one carefully – we hate writing rejection letters.

But I do hope we’ll be able to work together … and for the long term. That’s what we’re all about.

Interested in Stocking COOK?

The Criteria:

1. We want to work with remarkable, vibrant food retail businesses where range, presentation and brand pride in the environment are obvious. If you are starting a business, we will need to see detailed business and financial plans to consider a partnership.

2. We’ll need the right amount of space for, at the very least, 2 x 1.7 metre chest freezer to display our meals – although be aware in some areas we will be looking for space for 4 or even 6 freezers. The Novum Main Line model has been selected, as it fits our food packaging, is reliable, and our COOK point-of-sale material has been tailored to fit around it. The current cost is £890 each plus VAT each, which we charge at cost price. Point-of-sale material (including the A board) is supplied free of charge and will be maintained and updated by the team at COOK.

3. We hope it goes without saying that we will expect your shop to be clean, tidy, vibrant and well merchandised. In short, it needs to a good fit with the COOK brand.

4. Another obvious one is that you should have sufficient footfall and a suitable customer base to make a COOK Concession commercially viable for us both.

5. Last but not least, it won’t work if you’re too close to other COOK Concessions or COOK shops, as we don’t want to impact the sales of our exiting partners. We will consider this on a case-by-case basis.