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Bidfood

UK wholesaler and distributor

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 14, 2026
Entity authorityQ4835535
Source-derived summary

BFS Group Limited, trading as Bidfood, is a foodservice wholesaler and distributor based in the United Kingdom.

The BFS Group Limited was a wholly owned subsidiary of Bidvest, an international services, trading and distribution company listed on the JSE Securities Exchange in South Africa. It is now a wholly owned subsidiary of BidCorp, also listed on the JSE. BidCorp, the Bid Corporation Limited, is the holding company of the Bidvest Group Limited.

History

BFS Group, trading as Booker Foodservice, was originally owned by Booker Group, having been formed through a series of acquisitions and mergers. In May 1999 Booker sold the company to Bidvest Group, in November of that year the company was re-branded as 3663, with the slogan "First for foodservice". The name "3663" spells "food" on a telephone keypad and is pronounced "three double-six three".

In 2003 BFS Group acquired Swithenbank, a fruit and vegetable supplier based in Bradford, and Wilson Watson, a catering equipment supplier which was subsequently rebranded as 3663 Catering Equipment.

In 2006, as BFS Group Ltd., the company challenged the proposed award of a Ministry of Defence (MoD) food supply contract to a competitor. BFS' case was that the Defence Logistics Organisation, part of the MoD, had failed to act fairly or transparently, had acted unlawfully by failing to undertake any negotiation with BFS, and that the bid evaluation criteria had not been applied fairly. The challenge was unsuccessful.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Bidfood” as uK wholesaler and distributor. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1999, 2003, 2006—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. The account is most persuasive where Bidfood, wholesaler and distributor can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as uK wholesaler and distributor. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4835535. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1999, 2003 and 2006.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Bidfood”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Bidfood primary sources, Bidfood archive and Bidfood research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Bidfood”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Bidfood” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.