Food First Consulting

Why Food First Consulting?

“I love helping buyers and suppliers do better business together”

Food First Consulting was founded by Malachy O’Connor, an experienced and passionate food industry professional. Over the years, he saw so many potentially great deals fall through, not because buyers and suppliers disagreed, but because they were on completely different pages, with completely different needs. Our vision is that those great, once in a decade deals, don’t need to be so rare. Our mission is to help suppliers and buyers do better business together by understanding each other’s needs, by bridging the gap between them.

Food First Consulting bridges that gap.

Based in Ireland, we have a unique knowledge of the retail world with a broad skills set thanks to +20 years experience in food technology, buying, buying director and marketing director roles, in a variety of c-store, multiple and discount supermarket retailers.

We offer 3 core services:

Retail Insights

Negotiation Skills

Strategy Development

Food First Consulting provides services to a broad spectrum of clients.

Start-ups and smaller businesses can access advice either directly via Food First Consulting or via Enterprise Ireland where Malachy is a business mentor.
SME and larger branded businesses can access support directly via Food First Consulting.
Private Label focused manufacturers and retailers can engage via IPLC (International Private Label Consult).

GET IN TOUCH

We’re eager to discuss your business needs and answer any questions you may have.

WHAT WE DO

Everything we do is based on our values: Impact, Comradeship and Creativity.

We believe in living and working with integrity and empathy so that we can have a positive impact on the world. We’re stronger together, as comrades, we encourage and challenge each other, we have each others backs. And we are diverse, so we take perspective and look at things differently finding creative solutions in unlikely places.

Food First Consulting was set up to bridge gaps. We do that in three ways.

Retail Insights

Malachy will help you get you inside the heads of the major retailers and help you do more and better business by understanding their pressures, their dynamics, what they want and what they need.

Negotiation Skills

Malachy will train you and your team to negotiate effectively with potentially bigger and more powerful opponents. Malachy can also strategically support on specific negotiations.

Strategy Development

Malachy will work with your team to develop a business strategy, be that for your entire business or with a specific segment or customer in mind.

IPLC

IPLC (International Private Label Consulting) is a boutique consultancy firm specialising in strategic consultancy services and project management support to manufacturers and retailers.

With a broad and unrivalled understanding of the Private Label industry, we help our clients with a pragmatic and action-orientated approach.

Grocery Market Share to 14th June 2020

Headlines The Kantar Worldpanel data for the 12 weeks to June 14th places Supervalu in 1st place with 22.9% market share of the take-home grocery market. Tesco have solidified second place with 21.5% and Dunnes stay third, having slipped further to 20.5% market share. Lidl are fourth with 12.2% and Aldi are fifth with 11.9%. […]

Aldi, covid-19, Dunnes Stores, grocery retail, insights, kantar, lidl, market share, SuperValu, Tesco

7th July 2020

Grocery Market Share to 17th May 2020

Headlines The data from Kantar World Panel, for 12 weeks to 17th May 2020, places SuperValu in top position again, stretching their lead, with 22.4% of the ROI grocery market. Tesco have moved up to second on 21.8%. Dunnes continue to slip and are now third, on 21.0%. Lidl are steady with 12.0% share, ahead of […]

climate crisis, consumer trends, covid19, discounters, FMCG, grocery industry, Malachy o connor, market intelligence, supermarkets, sustainability, sustainable sourcing

3rd June 2020

Sustainability after Covid-19

Introduction Through January and February 2020, the IPLC team in nine European countries completed a detailed review of the sustainability strategies of all the key grocery retailers. We were able to compare and contrast the activities of over 60 retailers, looking at what commitments they were making in PR and online and comparing that to what […]

Clients