HoReCa

HoReCa is the part of FMCG selling that goes into hotels, restaurants, cafés, and similar venues where your product is used, served, and judged on the spot. It is less about shelf competition and more about menus, staff habits, and whether the place can rely on you week after week.

Also known as: hospitality channel, foodservice, on-premise (note: overlaps, not identical).

What HoReCa means

HoReCa is shorthand for Hotels, Restaurants, and Cafés. In practice it also includes bars, pubs, clubs, canteens, caterers, quick service restaurants, bakeries, leisure venues, and sometimes even workplace dining, depending on the company’s channel definitions.

Selling into HoReCa is relationship driven because the “product” is often an experience, not a pack on a shelf. A chef cares about consistency and prep time, a bar manager cares about pour cost and speed, a hotel cares about guest satisfaction and supply reliability, and the owner cares about margin and hassle.

It is also menu driven. If you win a menu placement, a cocktail list, or a dessert feature, you can get steady volume without fighting for facings every week, but you also have to earn that spot with service, training, and ideas that actually work in a busy venue.

HoReCa vs retail

Retail buying logic is built around rotation, price ladders, space, and promotions that hit thousands of shoppers. HoReCa buying logic is built around usage, serving, and repeatability, how does this help me serve customers tomorrow, with minimal drama.

Pack formats shift immediately. Retail wants consumer packs and clear price points, HoReCa often wants bigger packs, multi packs, concentrates, bag in box, foodservice cartons, and formats that fit a fridge, a bar station, or a small kitchen storage room.

Decision makers are different too. In retail you often sell to a chain, category, and central buyer, in HoReCa you may sell to an owner, chef, bar manager, procurement partner, or a distributor rep who influences the list. “Visibility” is not a shelf, it is a menu line, a tap handle, a fridge sticker, a back bar placement, a dessert board, a staff recommendation, or simply being the default product they reach for under pressure.

HoReCa vs on-trade

On-trade is often beverage specific language, it usually means places where alcohol is consumed on the premises, like bars, pubs, nightclubs, and many restaurants. It is heavily tied to serving rituals, draught versus bottle, and what the bartender pushes when the venue is loud and busy.

HoReCa is broader. It includes beverage, food, snacks, coffee, desserts, and non alcoholic options, plus hotels and cafés where “on-trade” might not even be the way the team talks. They overlap a lot, but not every HoReCa outlet is meaningfully “on-trade”, and not every on-trade focused plan covers the hotel breakfast buffet or the café pastry counter.

What “winning” in HoReCa looks like

• Getting the listing, meaning you are on the venue’s approved buy list, and ideally on the distributor’s list too.

• Securing menu placement, for example a named drink, dessert, or coffee line that makes your product the default choice.

• Building staff advocacy, so waiters, bartenders, and kitchen staff recommend it because they trust it and like working with it.

• Ensuring reliable delivery, with a clear order rhythm and no surprises when the venue is in peak season.

• Keeping consistent availability, because one stockout can undo months of habit building.

• Selling the right pack formats, sized for storage, speed, waste control, and the way the venue actually serves.

• Supporting activation or visibility support, like simple menu inserts, table talkers, staff tastings, or a seasonal feature that fits the venue.

A simple example

A field seller targets a mid sized hotel restaurant that is refreshing its spring menu and wants a new non alcoholic drink option. The seller agrees a listing through the venue’s preferred distributor and confirms which pack format fits the bar’s storage and serving speed.

Next, the seller proposes a simple activation, a two week “spring spritz” feature that uses the product in a signature serve. They bring a one page serve guide and a short staff script, then they run a 15 minute tasting with the team before the first weekend rush.

To keep it easy for the manager, the seller builds a small customer specific deck with the serve, ordering details, and a few visuals, then shares it as a link. The manager forwards it internally, and the seller can see what was opened and viewed, so the follow up is based on reality, not guessing.

Two weeks later, the seller checks in, confirms availability, fixes a small ordering issue, and swaps the visuals to match the venue’s early summer terrace period. The placement stays because the staff keep recommending it, the delivery stays steady, and the materials stay simple enough to use during service.

Common mistakes

• You push retail logic, like deep price cuts and shelf style promos, into a venue that cares more about workflow and repeatable serves.

• You bring the wrong packs, then everyone fights with storage, waste, and slow service, and your product gets dropped.

• You ignore staff, then wonder why nothing moves even though the owner said “yes” in the meeting.

• You do no follow up, so one delivery miss or one staff change quietly kills the placement.

• You overcomplicate materials, then nobody reads them and the “activation” becomes a folder on someone’s desktop.

• You forget seasonality, so you sell a winter idea into a terrace period, or a summer feature into a quiet month.