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Coronavirus: Hong Kong airline caterer Gate Gourmet dishes up recipe for survival in troubled times
- Coronavirus-related border closures and travel restrictions have hammered airlines – but airport service providers have fared even worse
- Gate Gourmet used to have a daily output of 22,000 airline meals before the pandemic struck but has had to find other markets to keep its kitchen running
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It once produced more than half a million airline meals each month, but caterer Gate Gourmet’s Hong Kong airport kitchen is just a shadow of its former self, notching up a record low of 83 servings one day recently.
Coronavirus-related border closures and travel restrictions have hammered airlines over the past year, but the companies that provide meals and other services for their passengers have fared even worse – and have had little support from governments.
Detailing a year of crisis and change, innovation and invention, Gate Gourmet executive Peter von Huene-Chan revealed the company’s kitchen had hit its unwanted record one day last month, a far cry from the daily output of 22,000 airline meals before the pandemic struck.
The global health crisis has battered the fragile business models of airport service firms such as caterers and baggage handlers, which generated their main source of income through passengers flying.
With no domestic flights to stimulate air travel, Hong Kong records on average 70,000 passengers a month instead of the 6 million it saw in the past.
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