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INTERVIEW

Carot’, a happiness booster by Coline Casini (SK 2010) and Pierre-Yves Coeurdevey (SK 2012)

22 July 2020 INTERVIEW

First off, tell us a bit about yourselves?

I am Coline Casini, a graduate of the SKEMA Class of 2010 on the Sophia Antipolis campus. I worked for six years in sales and then in management before moving over to cooking and attending the Ferrandi school of culinary arts in Paris. After several experiences in cookery and patisserie in Paris and New York, a year ago I joined Pierre-Yves in Lyon to start Carot’.

I am Pierre-Yves Coeurdevey, a graduate of the SKEMA Class of 2012, also on the Sophia Antipolis campus. I was also vice president of Xtrem Intention. I worked for six years in sales management at Michel et Augustin before co-founding Carot’ with Caroline in 2019.

 

What is Carot’?

Carot’ is fresh, tasty and balanced meals prepared daily in our kitchens and distributed via our connected self-service “corners” set up directly on company premises.

What we want most of all is for all employees, wherever they may be, to have access to healthy, tasty food for the price of a “ticket restaurant” (in France, an employer-subsidised meal voucher -- Ed.). But our goal is also to adapt to new lunch-break trends by freeing employees of the many constraints linked to current available lunch options: no more queueing at the local restaurant at 12.30 and running out of food options after 1 pm or having to pre-arrange your order and wait for it to be delivered. We want every employee to enjoy their lunch break at their own pace, while guaranteeing them a fresh, tasty and balanced meal available 24 hours a day from the Carot’ corner.

Carot’ is a great way for companies to improve the quality of life in the workplace without the hassle of having to manage anything. We take care of everything and our algorithms enable us to trigger necessary replenishments automatically.

And lastly, with Carot’ we wanted our approach to be sustainable: we source local and seasonal ingredients, for example, we use eco-friendly packaging, deliver by bicycle, we redistribute our unsold meals on TooGoodToGo and to food charities, and we compost our waste.

 

What motivated you to start this venture?

Everyone should have the option of eating fresh and balanced meals every day. It should be possible every day, at any time and regardless of where you work. The price should also be affordable. That is how our project took shape. We wanted to break down all the barriers preventing workers from eating healthy food every day, and contribute actively to their well-being.

 

What are your development plans for the future?

Today, Carot’ is a real hit in France’s Rhône-Alpes region. Although we want to continue to expand our business in that part of the country, our ambition right now is to take it nationwide. We are going to begin raising capital to continue to develop the technology in our “corners”, but also to take on Paris and then France’s other ten major cities within the next few months. To preserve the quality and freshness of our production, we are going to replicate our current set-up in each of our chosen cities by opening a central kitchen for local sourcing.

Contacts: Coline Casini (SK 2010) and Pierre-Yves Coeurdevey (SK 2012), Carot’ founders

 

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