School Meals Matter - Ealing Profile Part 1

Monday 08 February 2010

This week sees the start of the Caterer and Hotelkeeper magazine's School Meals Matter campaign, and to help them raise the profile we'll be focusing this week's blog on our contract with the London Borough of Ealing, where we provide school meals for 8,500 children across 59 primary schools.

In August 2003 Harrison were awarded the contract to provide school meals in 59 primary schools in Ealing. With the almost daily outcry against rising obesity rates in the UK and the reputation of school meals in decline, Ealing needed a trustworthy, flexible contractor to work in partnership with them and create a school lunch service which would be a benchmark for London.

We immediately improved the food quality through our company methodology of preparing meals on site every day from fresh ingredients - but in order to make this work we also began a comprehensive training program, sending a number of staff each year on a day-release NVQ course (Level 2 Professional Food Cookery).

We have been able to increase meal numbers through a range of initiatives: we introduced localised menus across the borough - 50 of the 59 schools have a specifically tailored menu; thanks to the support of Ealing Council we are able to provide free lunches for a week for all new reception children when they first start school, encouraging them to see school meals as the norm; and we organise regular playground tasting sessions for parents and children at the end of the school day to encourage further uptake. This not only encourages parents to engage with us - trying and talking about the food (gathered under our fetching Harrison branded gazebo!) - but it also gives us the chance to reach out to parents who may be eligible for Free School Meals but have not had the opportunity to get to the council offices and fill in the relevant paperwork. Ealing Council provide delegates from this department to come down to the schools and fill in the paperwork on site, meaning more children can get the benefit of a fantastic hot lunch every day.

We have reduced costs through a number of measures, the most significant of which was the removal of cash collectors and the introduction of a centralised online payments system - which also provides flexibility for parents to choose which days their children have meals. We have also reduced costs by accurately tailoring staffing levels to meal numbers and service requirements.

The results in Ealing speak for themselves: for the three months starting September 2009, we saw a 16.5% LFL increase in uptake, and the introduction of the online payments system has reduced the cost of meal payment from 25p per paid meal to 12p - reducing the client subsidy. The initial 5-year contract has been extended by another 5 years, and we continue to look to the future of working in partnership with this forward-thinking, well-managed Local Authority.

Later this week we'll be looking more closely at our staff and their achievements, and the work we have done with Ealing Council on reducing our impact on the environment and community.

For more information on the School Meals Matter campaign, click here.

Posted by Giles Cooper

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