The corporation which Door County uses for jail meals has been doing poorly. It might be good for Door County to end the contract now instead of waiting to see what happens.
The food services contractor for the Door County Jail plans to hike costs by 7.7% for the next year. The exact costs are on a sliding scale, listed in a table: https://www.co.door.wi.gov/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/_09122023-1524#page=4.
There is a map on pages 6 to 7 of https://issuu.com/eliorna/docs/pierce_county_wi_final, which shows that the business in question, Summit Food Services, isn’t used much in Northeast Wisconsin. The nearest jail which contracts with Summit is the Oconto County Jail. Other than that, the rest are further away than Fond du Lac.
This particular county in the issuu.com link has a much larger jail, and they are charging a little more than a dollar and a half per meal, less than Door County will be charged.
What about Kewaunee County?
https://doorcountydailynews.com/news/622837
It is important to note that all of these meals are being provided at the amazing low cost at approx. $2.00 per meal.
Looking at several of the price points in the agenda for Door County, the cost next year will be $3.436 for when there are 55 inmates, sliding down to $2.586 per meal at 85 inmates.
These costs are significantly more than what Aramark Services charges Brown County. Aramark is a large institutional food services business; especially for educational institutions. There are some documents online from some years back when Brown County puts it out to a bid. I imagine it was competitive given the number of inmates.
Summit Food Service is a the corrections brand name of Elior North America, which like Aramark contracts with a lot of schools. The President & CEO on the Summit website, https://summitfoodservice.com/about/, is also listed on the Elior North America website: https://www.elior-na.com/our-leaders/brittany-mayer-schuler. Elior is based in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Elior North America is part of Elior Group, a publicly traded corporation with operations in five countries in Europe and North America. Their stock has done poorly: https://www.reuters.com/markets/companies/ELIOR.PA/charts
It makes sense why they need to raise prices for jail meals, so their stock price goes up again. Their stock is traded in Paris using the euro. They went from a high of nearly 26 euros per share in 2017 to less than 2 euros recently. They used to pay out dividends, but their last dividend was on April 7, 2020.
48% of Elior Group’s stock is owned by Derichebourg SA: https://simplywall.st/stocks/fr/consumer-services/epa-elior/elior-group-shares/news/both-public-companies-who-control-a-good-portion-of-elior-gr. The largest of the two is Derichebourg SA, which is mainly in the waste hauling and recycling business. Its commonality with Elior isn’t from the food services element, rather it is on the municipal services contracting side of things. They are experts in how to make money contracting with local governments.
This past February, this was in the minutes
https://www.co.door.wi.gov/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/_04042023-1425#page=3
Lieutenant Veeser states the jail has used Summit Food Service for many years and is satisfied with their services. Lieutenant Veeser states he received notice in December that the increase for 2023 was going to increase by 8.5% instead of 2.5%. The 2024 increase will be negotiated 120 days prior to the amendment anniversary.
Motion by Robillard, seconded by Beardsley to approve the Summit Food Service two-year extension. Motion carried by voice vote.
This compares to the proposed contract in the agenda, which states that the next increase will be at 5% unless otherwise stated.
Although this quote says it was a two year contract, they don’t need to approve the second year if the cost increase is decided to be too much. It would be possible to imitate Kewaunee County instead.
Another aspect is the quality of the food, and how they treat their employees.
From 2019, there is a negative article about Summit Food Service in Missouri: https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2019/oct/7/report-summit-food-services-provides-inadequate-nutrition-missouri-jail/. It discusses a study carried out by a retired judge at the Boone County Jail (BCJ) in Columbia, Missouri, and a follow-up by a grand jury.
The 147 reviews at https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Summit-Food-Service/reviews includes some really negative reviews.
Lt. Veeser has been happy with their past services, but their level of performance and value was made possible through a massive destruction of investor capital, while at the same time taxing employee morale. This food services business has dug quite the hole for themselves, and hopefully they can find a way out of it.
At the same time, it would be best if Door County doesn’t have to bear the burden of saving their operation. The future situation with Summit Food Service looks like “caveat emptor” will apply more strongly as time goes on.