CATERING INDUSTRY


Catering industry or food and beverage industry refers those places, companies and institutions that provide meals eaten from home. This industry includes restaurants, hospital and school cafeterias, catering operations, and many others format including "on-premises" and "off-premises" caterings.

              Catering is multifaceted segment of the food service industry. There is a niche for all types of catering businesses within the segment of catering. The catering industry can be divided into three classifications; commercial segment,non-commercial segment, and military segment. Catering(food and beverage service) management may be defined as the task of  organizing, controlling, planning and executing.

CATERING SEGMENTS


Commercial segment : 

  1. independent caterers 
  2. Hotel/Motel caterers
  3. Restaurant 
  4. Catering firms
  5. Private clubs

Non-commercial segment : 

  1. School catering 
  2. Health care facilities 
  3. Transportation catering 
  4. College and University catering 
  5. Business / industry accounts 
  6. Recreational food service. 

Military segment :

  1. Military functions 
  2. Diplomatic function 

TYPES OF CATERING 

There are mainly two types of catering "on-premises" and "off-premises" caterings that may be a concern to a large and small caterer. 
Catering or food and beverage service can also be classified as corporate or business catering and social catering. Business catering includes meetings, civic meetings, stockholders meetings, product launches, educational training sessions, seller-buyer meets, service awards banquets, and entertaining in hospitality suites. Social catering includes weddings, bar and mitzwahs, high school reunions, birthday parties, and charity events. 

On-premises catering :


On-premises catering happens when your kitchen and venue are at same location where the event is going to held. For example, caterer within hotel or banquet Hall will prepare and serve all of requirements without taking any service or food outside of the facility. On premise catering includes school, University /college catering, hospital catering.

Off-premises catering :

Off-premises catering heppens when food prepare at one location and serve at different location from where its prepare. 
They fall into one of three categories :
Party food caterer
Hot buffet caterer 
Full service caterers 

TYPES OF CATERING ESTABLISHMENT


There are many types of catering establishment. e.g.

1.Restaurant: A restaurant is a establishment that serve the food and beverage to the customers, to be consumed on the premises.

2.Transport catering : in this catering, food and beverage is provided to the customers before, during and after a journey on trains, aircraft and ships and also in buses or private vehicles. Transport catering includes airline catering, railway catering, ship catering and surface catering like buses which operate for long distance routes.

  A). Airline catering : In airline catering, food and beverage is served to airlines passengers in aircraft as well as at restaurants situated at airport terminals. Catering to airlines passengers en route is normally on contract with reputed hotels or catering contractors or to the catering unit operated by the airline itself.

  B). Railway catering : Provision of food & Beverage to the railway passengers both during the journey as well as during halts at different railway station is known as railway catering. On-board meal services also provided on long distance travelling.

  C). Ship catering : catering to cargo crew and passenger, ship passenger on board the ship is termed as ship catering. Ships have kitchens and restaurants on board. The quality of facilities and service which offered, depends on the class of the ship and the price which passengers are willing to pay. They also have room service and cocktail bar to speciality dinning restaurant.
  D). Surface catering: catering to passengers who travelling by surface transport such as buses and private vehicles is known as surface catering. These establishment are normally located around a bus stand or on the highways. They may be either govt. Run restaurants, or private establishment. For example, there has been growing popularity of panjabi style eateries known as dhabas.

3.Outdoor catering: in this catering, food & beverage provided  by suppliers. The venue left to the peoples choices. Hotels, restaurants & catering contractors meet this growing demand. Outdoor catering likes catering in function such as marriages, parties, conventions.

4.Retail store catering: This type of catering comes in known when large departmental stores wished to provide food & beverages to their customers as a part of their retailing concepts. It is inconvenient and time consuming for customers to take a break from shopping, to have some refreshments at different locations.

5.Club catering : Provision of food & beverage to a restricted member clientele is termed as club catering. Some examples of clubs like cricket clubs, golf clubs, turf clubs etc. The food & service in these clubs is always be fairly good standard and are economically priced.
Night clubs are usually situated in metros cities that have a urban crowd. They offer entertainment with the expensive drinks and food.
6.Welfare catering : welfare catering refers to provision of food & beverage to people to fulfil a social obligation, determined by a recognised authority. It includes catering in schools, colleges, hospitals and armed forces and prisons.
Industrial catering : catering to the people at work in industries and factories at highly subsidised rate is known as industrial catering. Catering for a large work force may be contracted out to professional caterers or may be undertaken by management itself.
7.Leisure - linked catering : catering to the people engaged in rest and recreation activities is known as leisure linked catering. Likes sale of food and beverage through different stalls and kiosks at exhibitions, theme parks, galleries and theatres.