How Staff Lunch Can Help Your Business

You don’t need to spend a heap of money and time on expensive retreats and gifts for your employees. Sometimes, making your staff happy can be as simple as arranging for croissants and yoghurt for breakfast or providing corporate lunch catering at work. According to a recent survey, 41% of respondents felt that the best corporate gift they could receive was food at work. The survey also found that 60% of respondents felt that having food in the office would make them feel more ‘valued and appreciated.’

The good news is you don’t need to be the size of Facebook or Google, nor is it expensive to provide free corporate lunch for your employees. Whether it’s a daily or a weekly office lunch delivered to your workplace, employers can gain a lot from offering corporate catering.

Stronger connections between staff

Many of us sit in front of our computer monitors all day and ignore our colleagues. Until lunch time. A survey from Seamless found that 60% of respondents felt that a team lunch provided by their company would encourage them to eat with their co-workers.

With a shift towards more collaborative cultures, catered staff lunches are a great way to build and reinforce bonds between people. Offering free office meals can also facilitate conversations and team building between colleagues that otherwise wouldn’t interact. Catered office meals can also help foster creativity and new ideas that can benefit your company.

Increased employee morale

According to Peapod, 67% of survey respondents who have access to free food were ‘extremely’ or ‘very happy’ with their current job. And when staff are happy and morale is high, their productivity increases. This can result in a lower turnover of your workforce. If providing staff lunches can boost employee morale and build loyalty to your company, it may end up saving you money in the long run.

Increased productivity

A happy worker is a productive worker and providing healthy office catering can lead to better concentration, improved focus and memory.

Retention & talent acquisition

Finding and hiring great people can be a challenge and giving your HR department as many perks as possible will increase your chances of snaring the best talent. Furthermore, some studies suggest that it can cost between 6 to 9 months’ salary to replace, train and on-board a new employee.

A healthier workforce

Providing healthy team lunches in the office can be a win-win for you and your employees. When your staff are happy and healthy, they will cost your company less. They miss fewer sick days and are more productive. In fact, employees with an unhealthy diet are 66% more likely to be less productive compared to those who eat a healthy diet.

Providing a delicious, healthy working lunch in the workplace can also help build awareness and lay the foundation for healthy eating. It can also help deter staff from making poor food choices and help with weight control and overall health.

Team building

Some businesses spend thousands on retreats, scavenger hunts and other expensive team building exercises to try to keep their employees engaged. The good news is you don’t need to spend loads of money and time on these complicated activities. In fact, these efforts often backfire as employees don’t find them useful and may resent the time and energy consumed by the event.

We have found that the best way to build intimacy and bonds between staff and management is with food. A team lunch at least once a week is a great way to stay connected with each other, improve company culture and build a stronger team.

For new hires, food is a great way to get in and be part of the team straight away. The best part about staff lunches is that, unlike team building activities which may require some level of fitness or coordination, sitting together and eating is easy for everyone to participate in. From Mexican to Indian catering, there are loads of delicious cuisines to try every week or month that encourage the team to eat together.

Staff lunches for your office – Feedr

There are so many benefits to be reaped by providing a weekly staff lunch at your business. It’s affordable and an easy way to show your employees you appreciate and value them. To get started or more information about offering catered meals for your workplace, speak to the corporate catering experts at Feedr or get a free quote online. Whether it’s pizza catering, Mexican catering, burgers, healthy Vietnamese catering like rice paper rolls, or a roast chicken platter with salad, lunchbox catering, breakfast or morning tea, we have a wide range of curated staff lunch menus and plans to suit your needs and budgets in the UK.

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