It was at a US trade show in 1985 that the idea for Silver Chef was born. Seeing that the American home delivery pizza market was booming, and convinced of the market’s potential for growth in Australia, Allan English, Silver Chef’s founder and Managing Director, and a business partner, invested heavily in conveyor ovens. Unfortunately, it soon became clear that many pizza businesses could not afford to buy them. The solution? The ovens were rented out, and soon began to sell themselves.
Ten years later, Allan bought out his partner and devised a funding option that enabled small businesses to procure the equipment they needed, without committing large amounts of capital up-front. The new option, called Rent-Try-Buy®, has been at the centre of the Silver Chef success story ever since.