Philly's Aramark is sitting out these Olympic Games
Plenty of Olympic veterans from the Philadelphia area are in Rio for the 2016 games - basketball coaches Dawn Staley and Geno Auriemma and soccer star Carli Lloyd, to name a few.
Plenty of Olympic veterans from the Philadelphia area are in Rio for the 2016 games - basketball coaches Dawn Staley and Geno Auriemma and soccer star Carli Lloyd, to name a few.
But one longtime local Olympics player is missing in action this year.
After catering 16 Olympic Games since 1968, Aramark is sitting on the sidelines, not because it had to, but because it didn't bid for the huge and important job of feeding the athletes in the Olympic Village.
"It was a business decision," company spokeswoman Karen Cutler said, declining to explain further.
Aramark has always operated behind the scenes at the Olympics.
That's a function of the way the Games are financed. In return for millions of dollars in sponsorships, the International Olympic Committee wants to make sure its named sponsors get the publicity, not the purveyors who work in the background.
"We are restricted by the IOC from discussing our involvement publicly, past or present," Cutler wrote in an email.
"We don't want to jeopardize our long-standing relationship," she said.
Cutler was quiet about whether Aramark will bid on the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea.
"I cannot comment on any specific bids but can say that given our long, proud history of serving the Games, we explore all opportunities," she said.
McDonald's, an Olympic sponsor since the 1970s, paid the Olympic Committee an estimated $100 million to sponsor the 2012 Games in London, the British newspaper the Guardian reported.
The Olympics paid Aramark $50 million to feed the athletes, a company executive reported in an earnings call in May 2012.
"We don't do it to make a lot of money," said Christopher S. Holland, then an Aramark senior vice president and treasurer.
"It's a hugely complex operation that we're very proud of and have a great track record in doing," Holland said, adding that the Olympic Games brought in about $50 million.
Aramark had about $13 billion in revenue in 2011. It brought in $14.3 billion in revenue in 2015.
The company has served 16 Summer and Winter Olympic Games, starting in Mexico City in 1968 and more recently including the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing and the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.
In April 2015, the Guardian reported that Aramark was still negotiating with the Olympic Committee to serve four million meals. At that point in previous games - 16 months before the opening ceremonies - the catering contract had been signed, sealed and delivered.
Aramark has experience catering major sports events in Brazil: It provided food operations at many stadiums there during the 2013 FIFA Confederations Cup and the 2014 FIFA World Cup.
When awarding the bid for those Brazil competitions, FIFA officials lauded Aramark's Olympic and FIFA experience.
Aramark was excited, as well, talking about bringing great food to fans in Brazil.
"We look forward to utilizing our global culinary insights and expertise and working with FIFA," Marc Bruno, president of Aramark Sports and Entertainment, said in a news release announcing the deal.
The job of catering at the Olympics is complex, especially for the athletes' food-service provider, which could serve 60,000 to 70,000 meals a day, round the clock, from a kitchen the size of a football field, according to media reports.
To get an idea, a San Diego company that has a much smaller assignment - serving 16,000 meals daily to the international broadcast media - said it began working in Rio more than 18 months before the start of the summer games.
"We do a lot of background checks with the vendors," Behind the Scenes Catering owner John Crisafulli told the Times of San Diego.
"Rio is probably the biggest challenge because there is a lot of bureaucracy," he said. "It's hard to get people to agree with contracts."
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