Auditors & Food Safety Inspectors Archives

Claire Kirby

Claire Kirby - Hygiene Consultant

Industry Insights From a Leading Hygiene Consultant

Partner of Choice

As part of her twenty-plus years’ experience in the food industry, Claire’s expertise is regularly enlisted to streamline the cleanliness procedures, safety standards, and culture of compliance at some of the country’s largest companies, including Muller Yogurts & Desserts, Kraft Heinz, and Ecolab, among others.

Below are seven clips taken from an exclusive interview Claire carried out with Alex Carlyon, one of Klipspringer’s directors. In these, Claire shares some of her fascinating industry insights, her thoughts on the pressures of audits, and her experiences partnering with Klipspringer.

Claire Kirby, Director at Innovation Hygiene Consultancy

Claire’s background and initial dealings with Klipspringer

“When I walk into a factory, I look for certain things, one of them is the shadow boards from Klipspringer – and then I know I’m going to be okay!”

Listen as Claire details her extensive history of work in the food industry, her take on audits being “battles”, and a couple of entertaining anecdotes which illustrate the importance of seamless services and support by food safety and compliance companies.

The impact of strong vs sub-par food safety support

In the below clip, Claire emphasises the crucial importance of food compliance for keeping manufacturers afloat. She tells Alex about the catastrophic consequences of losing large customers for two of her clients – an unpleasant outcome which Klipspringer helped to prevent.

Claire’s experience partnering with Klipspringer

Compliance with confidence isn’t just a saying for us at Klipspringer – it underpins everything we do. Listen to the clip below to find out how we’ve delivered that confidence for Claire and her clients over the years, why it matters … and what a hygiene hug is!

Claire’s previous experiences with other partners

In this section of the interview, Claire tells Alex about her challenges when dealing with other food safety partners.

Adding value moving forward

Always eager to discover new ways to innovate and provide top-tier service, Alex asks Claire how Klipspringer can continue to provide value in future. In this clip, Claire offers various shrewd suggestions, based on her own time working closely with Senior Leadership Teams (SLTs) at some of the largest manufacturers around the UK.

The inside scoop on audits

“You can stage it as much as you want, but it never works that way!”

Penultimately, Claire reveals the exact process, step-by-step, of a typical audit, specifying the need for both preparation and flexibility. To provide a concrete example, she draws on her recent experience with a particularly thorough Tesco auditor!

Final words

In this final clip, Claire and Alex exchange words on what constitutes impeccable customer service, and why Klipspringer have been her dependable partner of choice for several years.