Bon Appétit Management Company

By Rebecca Repp, Bon Appétit Director of Catering and Brand Programs at Regis University in Denver. I met Scott Richter, Bon Appétit general manager and executive chef at WhiteWave Foods in Broomfield, CO, a few summers ago when we were opening the Regis University account. This summer we married, joining the ranks of those who met their life partners at Bon Appétit. A value we share with Bon Appétit and each other is volunteering, so we decided to share our honeymoon — or post-wedding adventure — with my new stepchildren, Brook and Avry, by volunteering in Nicaragua.

Editor’s Note: Midwest Fellow S.K. Piper’s two-year stint has come to an end, and we are happy to announce that she will be remaining with Bon Appétit Management Company as our sustainability manager at Denison University. Please welcome the new BAMCO Foundation Midwest Fellow and the BAMCO blog’s newest contributor, Alyse Festenstein!

Farm to Fork took on a whole new meaning — and a much shorter distance—this spring and summer at Regis University in Denver, as gardens planted and tended by Bon Appétit staff members yielded bounties for the kitchen.

You can take the boy out of the kitchen, but you can’t take the kitchen out of the boy.

Bon Appétit employees at Emmanuel College in Boston, MA, form a veritable United Nations of passion and talent. Our location brings us a diverse group of team members from Lebanon, Guinea, Bosnia, Cape Verde, Haiti, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Brazil, Somalia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Honduras, El Salvador, and Kenya. What’s truly astounding is how many of this diverse group of people have found a true home, and not just a job, at Bon Appétit.

Anyone with a sweet tooth that walks into the University of San Francisco’s Market Café is immediately drawn to the display of colorful little desserts at the bakery station. Some call it the dessert bar and others refer to it as the sweet shop, but most know it as Simone’s Patisserie.

How Bon Appétit Management Company defines “food service for a sustainable future,” that tagline that follows our company name, also defines our very identity as a company. In honor of our quarter-century anniversary, we asked our employees and others to brainstorm with us. Here’s the result.

Birthdays are a great time for reflection. When Bon Appétit Management Company was founded 25 years ago, in 1987, our priorities were cooking restaurant-quality food from scratch using the freshest ingredients, and delivering outstanding customer service. In 2004, we formally committed to sustainability, which we defined as “food choices that celebrate flavor, affirm regional cultural traditions, and support local communities without compromising air, water or soil, now and in the future.” We’ve been looking ahead to our next 25 years, and asking our teams around the country — and our guests — for their input on what should be next.

Bon Appétit Management Company was founded in 1987, by two food service industry veterans — CEO Fedele Bauccio and President Ernie Collins, later joined by COO Michael Bauccio — who had a vision of different kind of company. They set out to bring restaurant-quality food to corporations, universities, and specialty venues. Bon Appétit has become an industry pioneer in many other ways: the first to commit to local food, sustainable seafood, and cage-free eggs, and the first to tackled thorny issues such as food’s role in climate change, the reduction of antibiotics in agriculture, and farmworker rights. To celebrate our 25th anniversary, we worked with a great team at InHouse Creative Services to make this video about how we got here, and where we want to go next: The Story of Bon Appétit Management Company from Bon Appétit Management Company […]

On a visit to Colorado College, I was sitting in the student center, working on some things while enjoying the atmosphere of being on a college campus, when Executive Sous Chef John E. Faulkner sat down next to me. John has been with Bon Appétit for more than 15 years. I wish I’d had a video camera running. Instead, these notes will have to try to convey the spirit of the man who claimed “I am Bon Appétit!”