New catering outlets on EPFL's Lausanne campus
© 2021 EPFL /RESCO
Following a call for tenders issued by EPFL’s Catering and Shops Unit (RESCO) last fall, the School is pleased to welcome SV Group – one of the leading contract food service providers in Switzerland – to its Lausanne campus.
Under EPFL’s new service agreement with SV Group, the Le Parmentier, Le Vinci and Atlantide eateries will be merged into a single restaurant, FoodLab, which will offer three different types of cuisine at three separate outlets.
The first, Alpine, will prepare traditional dishes based on local specialties and gentle cooking methods.
The second, Native, will be a vegetarian and vegan restaurant with two groups of menus and a hot and cold buffet.
The third, Ginko, will offer sushi and Asian dishes with a show-cooking, fusion cuisine counter, to both spice up and complete FoodLab’s line-up.
SV Group will also manage the campus’s hallmark cafeteria, L’Esplanade, with three self-service stations: Al Forno, where you can find tasty oven-baked dishes; Pasta Time, where you can choose from a selection of freshly-cooked pasta; and Pick Up Here, where you can take away delicious meals prepared by Andiamo, SV Group’s service for healthy, varied dining options. These stations will operate until the end of 2022, when the renovation work is scheduled to be completed. Then a new dining concept will be introduced in 2023 to serve EPFL’s thousands of students – more information about that will be provided in due course.
EPFL selected SV Group because of the high quality of the caterer’s offering as well as its reasonable prices. Other factors included its healthy, sustainable meal choices, its socially responsible approach and its capacity for innovation. Sustainability is a core value at SV Group, and the company has been working with WWF Switzerland since 2013. Other values include buying local and regional products, offering an appealing range of vegetarian and vegan dishes, minimizing the use of plastic containers and preventing food waste. SV Group’s sustainability strategy is fully in line with the EPFL 20-30 strategy for sustainable catering.
In light of the pandemic restrictions, the new catering outlets will be opened in phases over the first four months of the year. Alpine (formerly Parmentier) and L’Esplanade will open on 11 January.