About Brakes

Brakes has been providing top quality food and catering supplies to the foodservice industry for more than 60 years.  The company was started by brothers Peter, William and Frank Brake from the back room of a pub, and since those early days Brakes has grown into the leading foodservice wholesaler in the UK.

The company now employs more than 6,500 people and has the most extensive range of own brand products in foodservice.  The entrepreneurial spirit of the Brake Brothers remains a lasting legacy for the business. The secret to their success was identifying what customers needed and the great and small things that will help them to succeed. Whether that’s being the first company to introduce frozen chips – an idea that was treated with derision at the time, but today is one of the biggest and most successful categories in foodservice - or simply printing customers’ menus to help them out, which the brothers did.  

The business may be bigger and more diverse today with an increased focus on other categories such as fresh produce, but understanding what matters to customers is still as important today as it was when Frank Brake was personally delivering orders across London in those early days.  

In 2016, Brakes became part of the Sysco family – giving Brakes access to new processes, products and technology that come from being part of the largest foodservice company in the world.