Existing investors put their shoulders behind the rollout of the smart fridges; Lore D'Hooghe (ex-COO Foodbag) becomes co-director.
Brussels, 4 September 2026 — The company restaurant has been under pressure for years, while companies look for ways to make working from the office more attractive. Gus Foods, which places smart fridges stocked with fresh, Belgian-made meals in the workplace, is raising €500,000 from its existing investors, topped up with bank financing. Today the company serves almost 5,000 unique customers per month and generated revenue of more than €1.5 million in 2025. At the same time, Lore D'Hooghe, COO at Foodbag for six years, is officially appointed as a director.
The classic company canteen never fully recovered from the pandemic. Office occupancy fluctuates, making large kitchens harder to run profitably, and many companies cut or thoroughly reformed their catering offer. Those who do come to the office lose their lunch break to a trip out or a queue, and end up eating hurriedly behind a screen.
According to founder Andreas De Ridder, that is the heart of the matter. "Companies invest heavily in their offices to get people to come back. In doing so, the impact of a proper lunch break is underestimated. For many people it is the only moment in the day when they can really disconnect from work and talk to colleagues about something else. If you lose that to a queue, you quickly lose more than half an hour. Good food at the office is not a perk, it is one of the few concrete levers an employer has on how people feel during their day."
The Gus Foods fridge sits inside the building itself and is open all day. The assortment covers every moment of the working day: snacks and breakfast, drinks, bread products, salads and hot meals. There is deliberate room for a wide range of tastes and budgets, from organic and healthy to a guilty pleasure on Friday afternoon.
For its dynamic offer, Gus Foods works with Belgian producers and local suppliers who prepare the meals fresh. "Convenience and quality are often presented as opposites," says De Ridder. "From day one we chose not to accept that: you grab something within a minute, and it comes from a Belgian producer we know by name."
The system now applies machine learning and AI in its daily operations. Gus Foods knows, per location, which days are busy and which dishes sell quickly, and tunes each assortment accordingly. That limits food waste and keeps the offer in line with what customers actually need.
The company is also increasingly positioning itself as a food & beverage partner for businesses by building out an offer of fruit, soup and other catering. Since the fridges are restocked several times a week, these items slot easily into the existing logistics flow.
Gus Foods can be placed profitably from roughly 50 employees on a single site, and also works in multi-tenant buildings, where the occupants together reach the required volume. Current customers span a wide range of sectors: law firms, pharmaceutical companies, logistics players and service providers. Sector, location or building matter little; what the customers have in common is a willingness to invest in good food and in connection in the workplace.
Gus Foods has also recently become an official partner of Sodexo, the largest player in catering and facility services in Belgium. Sodexo serves many clients with corporate catering, but not every client needs or has room for a full company restaurant. In those cases a smart fridge can be the ideal solution, and Sodexo can now rely on the expertise of its new partner. For Gus Foods, the collaboration opens the door to bringing its offer to even more business locations across Belgium, faster.
Today Gus Foods serves almost 5,000 unique customers every month, from Ghent via Brussels and Antwerp to Hasselt.
The €500,000 comes from Gus Foods' existing shareholders, a group of business angels including several tech entrepreneurs from the Ghent region, topped up with bank financing from Belfius Business Center Aalst.
Gus Foods will use the money to expand its presence across Belgium and to structurally anchor the company's profitability. "That our existing investors are stepping in again says enough about where we stand," says De Ridder. "We now know exactly what a location costs and what it brings in. Now it is a matter of repeating that across the whole country."
Lore D'Hooghe, who started working with Gus Foods on a freelance basis in October 2025, is officially appointed as a director. She was COO at Foodbag for six years and then Chief of Staff at OrderBilly, with HR, Finance and acquisitions in her remit.
"I feel at home in the Belgian food landscape and get energy from the challenge of bringing product, quality, profitability and a smooth logistics flow together in the best possible way. On top of that, my passion for the product and for local suppliers fits perfectly with what Gus Foods stands for," says D'Hooghe. "Gus Foods has proven that the concept works for customers in very different sectors. My job is to make that base so solid, operationally and financially, that growth is anchored in the way we work: strategic, scalable and with the right processes in place."
Together with De Ridder, she will steer Gus Foods towards a nationwide presence in the coming years.
Gus Foods places smart fridges with fresh meals at companies in all sectors. The assortment runs from snacks and drinks to bread products, salads and hot meals, put together with Belgian producers and local suppliers. Employees pay via the mobile app (meal vouchers accepted); predictive data ensures every fridge is stocked with what is actually eaten at that location. The formula works from roughly 50 employees on one site, and in multi-tenant buildings. The company was founded in 2020, already serves almost 5,000 unique customers per month and generated revenue of more than €1.5 million in 2025.
Press contact: Andreas De Ridder, founder — andreas@gusfoods.com. High-resolution images are available on request, free of rights for editorial use with the credit © Gus Foods.
