Brakes, the UK’s leading foodservice wholesaler, has launched a new vehicle livery to encourage women to consider a career in wholesale.

The vehicle, which is designed in purple, the colour of International Women’s Day, features three women in various wholesale roles and will go into service on the 8^th March, when International Women’s Day is celebrated across the globe.

Margaret Gooch, HR Director for Sysco in Great Britain, said: “Within Sysco, we aspire to create a culture that is diverse, equitable, and inclusive. We want to encourage people to apply to the company without restriction and ensure that we do what we can to remove systemic barriers and biases so that outcomes are based only on an individual’s talents, gifts and work.

“Women are under-represented in wholesale and we saw International Women’s Day as the perfect opportunity to get our latest vehicle on the road, emblazoned with photographs of women in a range of roles across the business.”

The new lorry will initially be based on Brakes’ Warrington depot, before embarking on a tour of Brakes depots, a moving billboard of some of the opportunities on offer to everyone.

Aicha Lahsen, who will be the first to take control of the new vehicle when it goes into service, said: “I love my career as a driver at Brakes, so it’ll be nice to encourage other women to follow in my footsteps. While it’s still unusual to see a woman driving a HGV, with the support of companies like Brakes, it won’t be long before we see more women behind the wheel.”

The launch of the new vehicle, which was led by Clare Lowrie, Senior Learning & Development Partner at Sysco in Great Britain, is part of the ongoing activities by IMPACT (which stands for Influence, Mentor, Potential, Achieve, Collaborate, Transform), which is the Sysco in GB female-focused colleague resource group. The group was founded in 2019 with a mandate to create safe spaces for women to share their stories, support each other and improve female colleague experiences, inspiring them to reach their goals and be advocates in driving balance for better.