Sudipta Dev – Mumbai
Inflight catering is one of the most important market segments for ready meals producers, who have adapted to the needs of airlines in terms of delivery and product variety. One of the leading companies in this industry, Gits Food Products, has been driving this business by being flexible in fulfilling the sector’s needs. “We have been flexible in customising our recipes and even developing special recipes as and when requested. Moreover, all ready meals players including us operated only in smaller 300g pouches however, we took the lead by offering 1 kg-catering pouches for this segment,” said Sahil Gilani, director, sales & marketing, Gits Food Products. He is the third generation of the 50 year old convenience food company.
For inflight catering Gits currently has over 50 ready meal products comprising of Indian, Chinese and Thai cuisines that are available in 1 kg catering packs. In addition they also have catering packs of instant mixes which are 30 ready-to-cook products. “Gits is also the first company to be approved by the railways board to introduce ready-to-eat packs on-board,” pointed out Gilani.
Talking about their strategy for airlines industry, Gilani mentioned, “We are looking to collaborate with this segment. In fact, we have proven success to deliver quality and value in the past for Oberoi Flight Kitchen who were catering the meals for Jet Airways.” According to him, being all natural and fully cooked, the ready meals offer several efficiency benefits to inflight kitchens by not only saving coss but also significantly reducing turnaround times. “Since only reheating is required, the food from the pack can be directly plated on to the airline trays and put into the heated chamber trolley. There is a reduction in skilled labor cost as well as a reduction in wastage,” he stated, adding that low-cost airlines can benefit greatly by selling ready meals on board and will be able to provide quality food at much lower price points of full service carriers. Currently, no low cost carrier has explored using ready-to-eat retort meals as their crew would find it cumbersome to reheat the packs on board. “However, we are confident to find a solution to this by working closely with the airlines,” he asserted.
Acknowledging that the food services industry is adapting modern packaged food technology to scale up and improve their services, Gilani mentioned, “It is time the travel sector also explores the merits of convenience foods. All packaged food is not bad or junk, there are brands such as Gits that provide all natural products. These myths once broken will go a long way to revolutionise the travel food space.”