---
title: "NEPO407 - Frozen Food"
ocid: "ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5"
canonical_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5"
markdown_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5.md"
json_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5.json"
source: "Find A Tender Service"
current_stage: "Award"
buyer: "THE ASSOCIATION OF NORTH EAST COUNCILS LIMITED"
published: "2025-07-08"
---

# NEPO407 - Frozen Food

Buyer: THE ASSOCIATION OF NORTH EAST COUNCILS LIMITED  
Current stage: Award  
OCID: ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5

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## Summary

This procurement process involves the awarding of a framework contract by The Association of North East Councils Limited for the supply of frozen food under the title "NEPO407 - Frozen Food". Targeted at Contracting Authorities in the North East of England, the framework aims to meet the frozen food supply needs for education establishments, including primary and secondary schools, as well as Council-operated sites. The industry category focuses on goods such as animal products, dairy, and fruit and vegetables, with the procurement process carried out under the direct award method due to urgency related to the withdrawal of the incumbent supplier. The direct award was finalised on 8 July 2025, with the contract period spanning from 18 July 2025 to 17 July 2027. The buying organisation is aligned with the UK procurement legislation 2023/54, and the procurement stage is in the award phase, with the framework facilitating multiple suppliers participating across various lots, defined for the North-East region. Each supplier is responsible for a specific geographical lot, ensuring a spread of suppliers like JJ Food Service Limited, P.F.D.(Carlisle) Limited, and Sysco GB Limited (Brakes), all delivering within their designated scope and regions.

This tender offers significant opportunities for businesses within the frozen food sector to grow by participating in a stable, ongoing framework. Large-scale suppliers experienced in managing diverse product categories such as meat, fish, dairy, and grain-based products are well-suited to compete in this framework, especially those able to provide reliable distribution across the specified North East locations. The procurement framework, by fragmenting into multiple lots, enables targeted geographical service provision while encouraging engagement from large suppliers capable of meeting stringent school food standards and dietary needs. Potential suppliers should note that pricing is initially fixed, with subsequent increases considered only when justified under the framework terms and conditions. Businesses keen on stability with the ability to adapt to evolving contract demands would find this framework beneficial, not just for immediate growth potential but also to align with future procurement strategies anticipated to commence in Q4 2025 for anticipated changes by Q1 2027.

## Notice

This Framework is being established for the provision of frozen food to Contracting Authorities in the North East only. The Framework will provide North East Contracting Authorities access to suppliers capable of meeting their requirements for the delivery of frozen food to education establishments, including primary and secondary schools, alongside Council owned and operated sites. Suppliers awarded to the Framework are able to provide concurrent deliveries across the North East, aligned to the delivery schedules of Contracting Authorities, including the specified days, restricted delivery windows and site entry requirements. The Framework will enable Contracting Authorities to provide their service users with the specialised supply of frozen food to ensure that essential allergen requirements are adhered to, school food standards compliance is maintained, and individual dietary needs are met inclusively

### Procurement Information

NEPO intends to award a Framework for the Provision of Frozen Food. This award will establish a multi-lot, multi supplier Solution for access only by NEPO's Member Authorities. The award is justified on the basis of section 41 and paragraph 13 of Schedule 5 of the Procurement Act 2023. The current framework is NEPO407 - Food and General Provisions and is utilised by North East Contracting Authorities to supply food for catering services in a range of environments, including pre-school, primary and secondary educational establishments, care facilities and Council operated sites. The incumbent Supplier on framework NEPO408 is Hopwells Ltd. The supplier has notified NEPO of its intention to withdraw from the Framework and terminate existing Call-Off contracts, effective July 18th, 2025. The termination of service to North East Contracting Authorities represents a significant risk to the provision of catering service to the school children, vulnerable individuals and the Council's residents and service users. Service users require specialised supply to ensure that essential allergen requirements are adhered to, school food standards compliance is maintained, and individual dietary needs are met inclusively. The risk to supply presents an acute risk to Contracting Authorities. Due to the timescales required to operate a full tender process, and the imminent risk of contract failure, NEPO have determined that a direct award is justified and necessary to avoid severe impacts to Contracting Authority's residents. The direct award will retain only existing provision and its original scope and safeguards the continuity of service for Contracting Authorities. Eligible Contracting Authorities have been named in the 'Participation' section of this Transparency Notice. The Framework will allow those Contracting Authorities named in this notice the ability to call-off with awarded suppliers at their discretion. NEPO is satisfied that the current supplier's decision to withdraw from the existing Framework presents an extreme and unavoidable urgency to protect Contracting Authority's service users. The urgency is unavoidable as it is not attributed to any act or omission of NEPO and could not have been foreseen by NEPO. The direct award will be for a term of two years, this term is considered strictly necessary for the reasons set out below. The intended two year term reflects the required time to enable an appropriate and proportionate return on investment for Suppliers. In mobilising at pace to meet the needs of the Contracting Authorities, Suppliers are anticipated to incur a number of costs including: - Implementation costs - Procurement and sourcing fees - Vehicle and asset costs - Site refurbishment - Additional staffing and resourcing costs - Systems and administrative fees Market engagement identified that, in the absence of an appropriate and proportionate term, Suppliers would be unlikely to meet requirements to an acceptable standard without investment or would be unable to service the Framework entirely. The primary users of the Framework are education establishments, which operate against academic years. To ensure that the Framework provides sufficient protection of supply for users, it is necessary for the award length to align to academic years. A shorter term would disrupt term time and would incur significant additional cost and resource for contracting authorities in duplicating implementation and operations and would present risk to continuity of pre-planned menus, which consider user requirements and strict allergen control. The value of the award reflects the historic demand of the Framework however the Framework provides no guarantee of any orders or value of goods. Contracting Authorities named in this notice make no commitment of exclusivity or use. NEPO has undertaken extensive market exploration to identify potential risks and inform its options appraisal. Multiple Suppliers, including regional SMEs, have been engaged to understand the market's capability, capacity, and readiness to support Contracting Authorities' urgent requirements in light of the decision taken by the incumbent supplier. Several rounds of dialogue have been undertaken with Suppliers to identify challenges in supporting delivery of the Framework scope, including: - Logistics and routing challenges - Investment requirements - Existing capacity - Ability to scale - Sustainability of service and cost - Risks to supply - Cost and commercial models - Price control - Service levels - Contract Management - Mobilisation - Timescales - Public sector supply challenges, including rigid delivery timescales and delivery windows. A second round of dialogue then took place to validate and test the robustness of Suppliers' ability to meet requirements was held prior to a pricing exercise, which requested proposals from Suppliers. To mitigate the risk of single supplier failure, the existing regional Lot was fragmented into 4 Lots, split geographically. Suppliers were asked to provide pricing for each Lot, where they were able to service that Lot in its own right. Following assessment, and in line with the disaggregation of demand into separate regional Lots, 3 Suppliers were identified as being best placed to meet the requirements of the Framework. NEPO intends to begin market engagement on the renewal of this Framework as a priority to ensure that the future iteration addresses the on-going risks to supply, reflects the changing dynamics of the supply market, and adopts a structure which retains value for money while providing greater resilience. It is likely that the renewal of this solution, alongside the wider renewal of NEPO food solutions will result in a significantly different approach to food procurement for the region. A comprehensive phase of discovery, engagement and assessment will take place in response to the existing challenges. Suppliers will be encouraged to provide feedback on how the renewal could be shaped to encourage participation. NEPO anticipates that market engagement will begin in Q4 2025, in anticipation of a future Framework award in Q1 2027 to replace this temporary, direct award solution. This timescale will allow the appropriate scoping and options appraisal in the design of the solution as well as an appropriate period for the effective mobilisation of the solution. Interested Suppliers are advised to register at www.open-uk.org to receive future updates on activity.

## Key Details

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Publication source | Find A Tender Service |
| Latest notice | https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/038386-2025 |
| Notice type | UK7 - Contract Details Notice |
| Procurement type | Framework |
| Procurement category | Goods |
| Procurement method | Direct |
| Procurement method details | Direct award |
| Tender suitability | Not specified |
| Awardee scale | Large |
| All stages | Award |

## Dates

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Publication date | 8 Jul 2025 |
| Submission deadline | Not specified |
| Future notice date | Not specified |
| Award date | 1 Jul 2025 |
| Contract period | 17 Jul 2025 - 17 Jul 2027 |
| Recurrence | Not specified |

## Values

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Tender value | Not specified |
| Lots value | Not specified |
| Awards value | £20,000,000 |
| Contracts value | £20,000,000 |

## Status

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Tender status | Complete |
| Lots status | Complete |
| Awards status | Active |
| Contracts status | Active |

## Buyer

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Main buyer | THE ASSOCIATION OF NORTH EAST COUNCILS LIMITED |
| Locality | GATESHEAD |
| Post town | Newcastle upon Tyne |
| Postcode | NE8 3DF |
| Country | England |
| ITL 1 | TLC North East (England) |
| ITL 2 | TLC4 Northumberland, Durham and Tyne & Wear |
| ITL 3 | TLC43 Tyneside |
| Local authority | Gateshead |
| Electoral ward | Bridges |
| Westminster constituency | Gateshead Central and Whickham |
| Delivery location | Not specified |

## Supplier

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Number of suppliers | 3 |
| Supplier names | JJ FOOD SERVICE; P.F.D.(CARLISLE)LIMITED; SYSCO GB |

## CPV Codes

### Divisions

- 15 - Food, beverages, tobacco and related products

### Codes

- 15100000 - Animal products, meat and meat products
- 15200000 - Prepared and preserved fish
- 15300000 - Fruit, vegetables and related products
- 15400000 - Animal or vegetable oils and fats
- 15500000 - Dairy products
- 15600000 - Grain mill products, starches and starch products

## Release History

- 8 Jul 2025 at 16:02 - Award - UK7 - Contract Details Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/038386-2025
- 2 Jul 2025 at 15:25 - Award - UK6 - Contract Award Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/036926-2025
- 1 Jul 2025 at 14:55 - Award - UK5 - Transparency Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/036509-2025

## Documents

- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/038386-2025
  8th July 2025 - Contract details notice on Find a Tender
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/036926-2025
  2nd July 2025 - Contract award notice on Find a Tender
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/036509-2025
  1st July 2025 - Transparency notice on Find a Tender
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/Attachment/A-2863
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/Attachment/A-2864
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/Attachment/A-2865

## Notice URLs

- http://pioneerfoods.co.uk
- http://www.brake.co.uk
- http://www.jjfoodservice.com
- http://www.nepo.org
- https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/54/contents

## Provenance

This Markdown file is an alternate public rendering of the D3 Tenders contract record. The canonical page is https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5. The underlying structured data is available as OCDS JSON at https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-0556f5.json.