Retaining their titles for another year, ASDA as ‘Retailer of The Year’ whilst Co-op retained the ‘Convenience Retailer of the Year’ award at this year’s Free From Foods Awards 2024 celebration party.

The Free From Food Awards is the UK’s only industry awards for ‘free from’ food and drink and was launched in 2008 to encourage innovation and celebrate excellence in the free from food and drink industry.

Other winners on the night included Crave securing Free From Small Brand of the Year, whilst The Big Dipper won the coveted title of Free From Food Product of the Year.

Oakland International Co-Founder and Retailer of the Year category sponsor, Sallie Attwell, commented: “Our congratulations to ASDA, Co-op and to all Free From Food Award category winners and finalists. As a total supply chain business we have seen first-hand how demand has increased for free from food across all service platforms thanks to consumer demand, so it was our pleasure to once again support the Free From Food Awards.”

A Certified B Corporation business Oakland International is a leader in direct to consumer, case consolidation, contract packing, storage and distribution, food tempering and brand development support for all types of food, serving various markets in the UK and Ireland. They are also experts in saving food and non-food products from being wasted via their distress load management service and are aiming to be the first in their sector to reach net zero.

Awards’ CEO Cressida Langlands commented: “Year on year the quality of entries increases, with the focus moving from showstopping, groundbreaking innovation, to product delivery – such as packaging and quality evolution, which is closing the gap between free from and main category alternatives.

“But for that food to be truly safe we believe that everyone in the industry should be collaborating to ensure a uniform approach to clear ingredient labelling.”

The full list of winners can be found on the awards website www.freefromfoodawards.co.uk