In 2008,

D
MESSAGE OF PIERRE BELLON
Sodexho’s Chairman and Founder
Making Every Day a Better Day 1.
The Quality of Life Architect
Sodexho’s mission is to improve the Quality of Life of the 40 million people we serve every day.
We seek to make our company and the Sodexho brand the most desirable and attractive in all of our business
segments.
At the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting, the Board of Directors is asking the shareholders to approve a change in the company
name and a revision to the visual identity in the form of a new logo.
The change in the Group’s name involves eliminating the word “Alliance” and the letter “h”. The name of the Group
would therefore be SODEXO.
The elimination of the word “Alliance”
From 1995 to 2000, we made three major acquisitions to
strengthen our international network: Gardner Merchant
in the United Kingdom, Partena in the Scandinavian
countries and Marriott Management Services in North
America. These three foodservices companies, all of them
much older than Sodexho, had demonstrated their success
through the skills of their respective employee teams. It
was important not to break up these entities but, on the
contrary, to help them develop further, to recognize their
merits, to welcome them on an equal footing and to avoid
at all costs creating opposition between the acquirers
and the acquirees – in other words, creating a perception
of winners and losers. To be perfectly clear, as I said at
the time: “Money will not buy a company’s history, culture,
skills and pride nor the motivation of the women and men
responsible for its success.”
Gradually, all three companies expressed a desire to adopt
the name of Sodexho. To gain their confi dence and to prove
that we keep our promises, we added the word “Alliance”
to the Sodexho company name.
During Fiscal 2006, we took an employee engagement
survey in 35 countries, interviewing 78,000 staff members,
including the entire management and a sample of 20%
of site employees. More than 80% of these employees
declared their attachment and their pride in belonging
to the Group and 83% stated they would not hesitate to
recommend Sodexho to a friend seeking employment.
It therefore seems to us that the word “Alliance” is no
longer necessary.
The elimination of the letter “h”
The primary purpose of eliminating the “h” is to facilitate
the pronunciation and spelling of our brand in any language
throughout the world. Studies we have carried out reveal
that in certain languages an “x” followed by an “h” is
diffi cult to pronounce.
The idea of eliminating the letter “h” has been discussed
from the start of Sodexho. From the beginning, the company
name was often mispronounced and misspelled. I therefore
suggested eliminating it, but the 5,000 people who made
up Sodexho at the time came essentially from the hotel
and restaurant industry and considered the “h” an integral
part of their identity. In view of their emotional reaction to
the idea, I decided not to pursue it. Today, however, the
diversity of our current services and those to come, as well
as the new competencies of our employees (especially in
Facilities Management) have made the elimination of the
“h” necessary, and according to our surveys, the idea no
longer elicits any particular reaction within the Group.
Rejuvenating our visual identity
The studies also indicate that we need a logo with greater
impact, more readable and more modern. We called upon
an agency specializing in brand strategy and design to
help us.
Here is the result of their work.
SODEXHO ALLIANCE 2006 − 2007 R e fe rence Document 7