How to Spot Provisioner Red Flags

The right provisioner adds value to your operation, but the wrong one can jeopardize it.

Provisioning has always been big money in yachting. It is not even the size of the yacht that makes the difference, it is the guests’ preferences. And with big numbers, the door is open for abuse. A dangerous culture has been creeping deeper into the industry, with chefs taking kickbacks from provisioning companies.

Some provisioners now openly tell chefs they will give them a percentage if they place orders with them. On provisioning bills of this size, a five to 10 percent kickback can put tens of thousands into a chef’s pocket. That money does not appear from nowhere — it comes directly from the owner or charter guests. The provisioner gets the monopoly, the chef gets the bonus and the client pays the price.

When I joined the industry in 2006, kickbacks were something you heard about, but usually it meant a few samples. A bit of produce to try, and if you liked it, you would add it to the next order. That was it. But in recent years, the practice has escalated sharply. Chefs are not just being offered kickbacks; some are now demanding them. Even when they know another provisioner has far better produce, they will refuse to use them unless money is offered under the table.

And that is only the first layer. The second is the way invoices are manipulated. It often works like this: a chef orders eight kilos of carrots. What arrives fits neatly into a crate, five kilos. Over time, that becomes normal. When another supplier finally delivers the full eight kilos, the chef thinks it is too much. On paper, the price per kilo looks fine, so if a captain checks, nothing stands out. But the yacht has paid for eight and only received five. Multiply that across fruit, vegetables, meat and fish, and owners are consistently paying 25 percent more than what actually lands in the galley. The missing weight is where the extra margin sits, and it helps fund the kickback. Fraud by any other name.

Then there is the third layer, which is exploiting mistakes. Errors happen. Four kilos of mangoes instead of just four mangoes. Five hundred grams of caviar typed as 5,000, so five kilos turns up. The honest approach is simple: pick up the phone, clarify and correct. But too often, provisioners do not. They ship it, charge it and cash in. That is not just opportunistic, it is a complete erosion of trust.

And underneath it all is a mentality that has been around for years: you need us, so you have to use us. Prices are marked up, yachts pay because they must and everyone looks the other way. But now, with kickbacks, under-deliveries and exploitation layered on top, the integrity gap is glaring.

It is also important to remember why yachts use provisioners in the first place. Tight itineraries leave little room for error, and captains need partners they can trust to deliver on time, every time. The right provisioner does far more than respond to a chef’s list. They understand the bigger picture — the expectations of the guests, the standards of the yacht and the pressure of schedules where there are no second chances.

Trustworthy suppliers bring experience, honesty and passion. They want to work with you to create the right guest experience, not exploit your budget. In the right hands, provisioning is not just a transaction, it is a partnership built on reliability, transparency and integrity.

And this is not only about money. Guests are being let down. They pay  for the best and end up with produce that is substandard, over-traveled and often chosen because someone is pocketing a kickback. No one charters a yacht expecting a tomato salad in the South of France made with plastic hydroponic tomatoes from a Dutch motorway greenhouse.

Provisioning should be about trust, quality and value. Kickbacks and fraud strip all of that away. Owners and guests deserve better.