Wellington, New Zealand, 2014-8-15 — /EPR Retail News/ — Wellington’s Westpac Stadium was this week filled with the glorious aromas and mouth-watering sights of the annual Foodstuffs Fresh and Grocery Trade Expo. From Wednesday 13 – Thursday 14 August Westpac Stadium was home to hundreds of supermarket suppliers showing everything from the latest supermarket equipment through to delicious deli delicacies.
The Foodstuffs Fresh and Grocery Expo at Westpac Stadium is an impressive event in every metric. As many as 1,500 supermarket owners, grocery managers and category department staff will meet with 240 suppliers over the two days – taking the numbers attending the event to more than 3,000 attendees.
Exhibition stand activity included celebrity chef Annabelle White on the Goodman Fielder stand demonstrating how fantastic the humble sausage roll really can be. Annabelle says, “Hot tip – we’ve added a generous splash of sweet thai chilli sauce to the sausage roll mix to get this great result.”
“The secret to enjoying twice the number of sausage rolls is to use Edmonds 40% less fat flakey pastry, people think I have added more fat to my sausage rolls as they taste so fantastic but in actual fact this is not the case. I love it when people realize that they can have ‘diet’ food that tastes so delicious,” jokes Annabelle. To find Annabelle’s dangerously good sausage roll recipe check out http://annabellewhite.com/sausage-rolls/.
On Wednesday evening attendees then had the chance to attend the Gala Dinner which, with ‘only’ 750 seats available is a sought after affair. This year’s Gala Dinner was held at the TSB Arena and was hosted by Pio Terei with entertainment from Dai Henwood, always a crowd pleaser.
The Foodstuffs Supplier Awards were another highlight of the evening with L’Oreal winning the Best Health and Beauty Display and taking out the top prize of Overall Best Foodstuffs Expo 2014 Display. Other winners included MG Marketing, Sealord NZ and Goodman Fielder.
Foodstuff New Zealand’s, Corporate PR Director, Antoinette Shallue was thrilled with the venue and its location. “It was great to take the show further south this year and give attendees the chance to enjoy our capital city for a short while. Expo 2014 was a huge success and the venue team really stepped up to the challenge. The facilities were great and its central location made it easy for all,” says Shallue.
“This year we have teamed up with Kaibosh Food Rescue, a Wellington-based not-for-profit organisation that links the food industry to community groups supporting people in need. All left over food, grocery and household products will be donated to Kaibosh who will distribute the goods to some of the 32 different charitable organisations they work to support,” says Shallue.
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