It was the most difficult two months of his life, says Bas Turk (46), with the low point being last Tuesday. That evening, the founder of Tommy Tomato, a company that provided healthy meals at schools, had to tell his hundred employees and one hundred and fifty delivery drivers that the business was bankrupt.
Tommy Tomato started serving meals full of vegetables at primary schools during corona times: 300 grams per child in the upper grades and 200 grams per child in the lower grades. Parents paid 4 euros (upper grades) per meal or 3 euros (lower grades). Over the course of six years, 380 primary schools joined the lunch program.
No profit was ever made. The company had razor-thin margins, Turk says, and “that made us very vulnerable.” He expected the end of 2027 break even to run, but that turned out to be too far into the future. The main lender (Life Tree Fund Foundation) announced in mid-March that it would not continue with financing, but after doing everything for four years, the founder emphasizes, to keep Tommy Tomato financially afloat. Life Tree Fund has also lost a lot of money due to the bankruptcy, according to Turk. “There are only losers at the moment.”
Wafer-thin margins
According to Turk, a major problem was that if a child at home said that he did not like the vegetables at school, the parents quickly switched to the familiar home-made sandwich. Also because it costs less money.
He and co-founder Erik van der Plas fervently hope for a restart. Fifteen “serious parties” have reported to the curators, says Turk. According to him, the need for healthy meals at school remains as great as ever. “Rich or poor, it doesn’t matter, almost all sandwich boxes are full of unhealthy food. We measure this in all kinds of places. Even in the wealthy Aerdenhout, a town in the municipality of Bloemendaal: if a school is doing very well, 40 percent of the lunch boxes are filled with junk. White bread with chocolate spread or chocolate sprinkles. Bifi sausages, croissants. One big sugar peak, and an hour and a half after lunch the teacher sees the children collapse again.”
In 2050, two-thirds of Dutch people will be overweight, RIVM expects. This already applies to half of adults.
Turk is optimistic that the restart will be successful. “We are now all in the office making plans to make it a success.”
