The "Scaling Without Failing" Roadmap: How to Navigate for Success as Your Food Company Scales Up

Countless food companies dream of growing from an idea to a brick-and-mortar to a regional or nationwide brand. But scaling up from a dozen employees to a multistate brand with 100+ team members entails a host of new hazards, from a breakdown in consistency and quality to the challenges of managing safety across far-flung locations.

On the road from start-up to household name brand, there are necessary steps companies must take to ensure they weather the growing pains - and that food safety never becomes an afterthought.

Stage 1: Establish Your Single Source of Truth

When operating out of a single location with a tight-knit staff, companies tend to operate off “tribal knowledge” instead of ironclad standard operating procedures. Everyone on the team wears multiple hats; the founder is often on the frontline with the rest of the team, and there is an expectation that everyone knows what they’re supposed to do, even if it isn’t written down anywhere.

But as a company and its workforce expand, it must codify all safety, quality, training, and consistency standards into a single official document or set of documents that can be accessed by management at all company locations.

This includes creating a formal HACCP plan and an overall food safety plan formulated by a team member with the requisite certifications. Basic Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs) for essential subjects like hygiene or sanitation must be compiled in a deliberate, careful manner and disseminated to all relevant staff and locations.

Companies should also appoint one person to oversee compliance and empower them to take action when problems arise.

Stage 2: Create Accountability as the Demands Grow

As a company stretches to multiple locations, management can’t be everywhere at all times and must begin to delegate responsibility.

When a founder or long-time manager no longer has visibility over all operations, there is a risk of a decline in product consistency, training, safety, and compliance.

To mitigate the risks of expansion, companies must put the right team members in place. Companies must hire a dedicated quality assurance/quality control lead to oversee these standards at multiple locations. Among other tasks, the QA/QC lead can supervise and manage internal audits on a monthly basis. This helps mitigate the risk of safety and compliance failures as the demands - and risks - grow.

Companies can use digital training and compliance management solutions to swiftly update standards when needed across all locations to ensure nothing falls through the cracks. Companies can use these digital platforms for recordkeeping and training management to enhance and streamline training.

Stage 3: Elevate Your Culture and Standards

When companies are on the verge of making the next major leap, those early startup days may seem like a distant memory.

By this point, the company is operating out of at least one very large facility and likely a series of production facilities in a variety of jurisdictions. The same SOPs that were codified at Stage 1 must be digitized and made available at all locations. And as the supply chain grows and becomes more complex, the company must also implement sophisticated vetting and end-to-end supply chain traceability to ensure safety.

At this stage, the company is in talks with major retail chains and needs to develop a robust safety culture and daily operational guidelines to succeed at the next level.

This is when companies typically seek out industry-recognized food safety certifications. These include certification programs that are benchmarked and recognized by the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), including the Safe Quality Food (SQF) scheme, Food Safety System Certification (FSSC 22000), and the British Retail Consortium Global Standards (BRCGS), to name a few.

These certifications are often required by major retailers and are a necessary step in getting product shelf space in nationwide chains.

But attaining major food safety certifications also helps companies achieve one of the most important requirements for scaling up safely: building a robust food safety culture. In such a workplace, people don’t follow safety demands purely because they are obligated to, but rather because doing so is an integral part of the culture.

To foster this culture, employees are given custom training that is relevant to their daily work tasks and is delivered in a language that they understand. This also requires the full buy-in of management and the empowerment of employees, who know that they can speak up on safety and take action when a potential issue arises, without having to run it up the flagpole first.

Is Your Company Ready to Scale Up Safely?

As companies expand, the risk of a food safety incident, product safety recall, and workplace accidents increases. If your company is on the verge of expansion or currently plotting its next big leap, your team must have the tools, training, and certifications needed to scale up safely. To see how the Rootwurks platform can help your team develop custom training that elevates safety, streamlines operations, and helps uphold quality and consistency, reach out to a member of our team today: