The Votes Are In...Wrights Pies Are The Winners
Shrewsbury Town’s first ever ‘Pie Idol’ competition went down a treat last night, with supporters voting for Crewe based Wrights Pies to be the official supplier for the upcoming season.Following on from the Supporters Parliament meeting with Town’s chief executive Matt Williams at the Greenhous Meadow, fans got the chance to sample a savoury selection of pies, pasties, sausage rolls and hot dogs from three separate companies – Wrights, Hollands and Clayton Park before voting on their favourite.
After half-an-hour of sampling and discussion in front of the Sky cameras, fans finally decided on Wrights Pies, a successful food company that has been running since 1926.
“We tried to replicate the menu that the supporters will have on a Saturday afternoon in terms of the pies, pasties, sausage rolls and hot dogs,” said Matt.
“It’s important that they get to see a different variety of suppliers and you know, the northern ones may have been my preference, but obviously they didn’t get the gig.
“I’ll phone Richard in the morning and tell him the good news. They’re very proactive and they’ll give us a lot of equipment for the concourse and they’re desperate to get involved with the football club which is great for us.”
In front of a healthy turn-out, last night’s meeting was further proof of the hard work the club are doing off the pitch to make sure that the fine line of supporter satisfaction and profit margins don’t come at a cost.
“I’ve absolutely no complaints (about the result). The fans won’t be able to complain to me that they don’t like the pies because they’re the ones that voted for them.
“It’s important that we had them involved. It would have been easy for us to make a decision and gone for the cheapest ones for us, which Wrights aren’t at the current stage. But they’re the ones that the supporters want so that was it.”
With the club bringing catering in-house this season, Matt admits it’s hard to put a figure on how much the club will save.
“I can’t put a figure on that now because we’re going into the unknown,” admitted Matt.
“We don’t know how many pies or coffees we will sell so it’s going to be very much trial and error but the good thing is that Wrights Pies, who the fans have voted for tonight, will know what are quantities were for the previous catering so that will give us a steal when we put our orders in for pre-season.
“It will very much be trial and error during the pre-season games on a staffing and supply level but hopefully we won’t have to take too many home but hopefully we won’t run out as well.”
“We tried the three companies about a month ago and these were the three that came in on price and quality.
“Wrights are from Crewe, which is not too far so they’ll bring them in on match day fresh and they’ll go straight into the ovens which is great for us. We just need to make sure we have plenty of warmers for them.”
The Supporters Parliament meet on a regular basis to discuss with the club, the thoughts and views of the supporters.
The meetings are open to any fan and new faces are always welcome to come along to the meetings.