Sterling Supergroup, the UK foodservice and wholesale buying group, has appointed two new directors to its board and unveiled a premium own-brand range called Diamond Selection, announcing both moves at its annual conference while celebrating its 60th anniversary.

The new board members are Mark Wright of FB The Wholesaler and Grant Le Tissier of Manor Farm Foods. Both joined the board ahead of a conference framed around the theme "The Next 60: Technology, Insight and Opportunity," a signal that the group's governance and strategy are being positioned for a further multi-decade horizon rather than a short-term cycle.

The Diamond Selection launch is the more commercially significant development for members. Premium own-brand ranges typically offer wholesalers and foodservice distributors a route to gross margin improvement that branded equivalents from major suppliers cannot match, since the distributor controls the pricing architecture rather than negotiating against a manufacturer's listed price. Sterling said further details on the range will be revealed soon; the group has not yet disclosed the number of SKUs, the product categories covered, or any target margin uplift, so the margin case remains asserted rather than measured until members see the range card.

Daniel Larkin, chief commercial officer, said: "This year's Annual Conference & Exhibition felt particularly special as we celebrated Sterling's 60th anniversary. The fantastic turnout, the quality of discussion and the support shown for our fundraising activities reflected everything that makes Sterling what it is today. The theme of The Next 60: Technology, Insight and Opportunity were about looking ahead and ensuring we remain well placed to support our members for years to come. We would like to thank everyone who attended and contributed to making the event such a success."

The quote confirms the group's stated priorities: technology, data-driven insight and member opportunity. For a buying group whose core value proposition is aggregated purchasing power, technology and insight increasingly determine whether members can translate negotiated buying terms into shelf-level competitiveness on inventory, ranging and pricing.

The board appointments also shift the group's internal balance of power. Wright comes from FB The Wholesaler, a member business that additionally won the Sustainability Member of the Year award at the conference's Gala and Awards Dinner. Le Tissier represents Manor Farm Foods. Bringing sitting member operators onto the board keeps decision-making close to the wholesale and foodservice businesses that depend on Sterling's negotiated supplier terms.

The awards dinner recognised performance across the group's membership and supplier base. T&L Wholesale took Member of the Year. Kiril Mischeff Ltd won Supplier of the Year. Within Sterling Caterers Essentials, Reids Foodservice Ltd was named Member of the Year and Délifrance (UK) Ltd Supplier of the Year. On sustainability, AB World Foods Ltd took the supplier award alongside FB The Wholesaler's member award.

The supplier awards function as a channel-power signal within the group: suppliers named by a 60-year-old buying group gain preferred visibility across its member base, while members recognised for sustainability performance align with the foodservice sector's growing procurement requirements around environmental credentials.

No financial figures — transaction volumes, member sales, or purchasing volumes under management — were disclosed at the conference, so the scale of Diamond Selection's potential margin contribution cannot yet be quantified against the group's baseline.

With the range details pending, the immediate test for Sterling will be converting the Diamond Selection announcement into concrete member uptake, with fuller specifics expected as the group rolls out the range.