Children Making Healthy ChoicesWhole School Meals is a model for providing excellent school meals and for keeping ownership of the company within the school community. Why not let us help you create your own social enterprise company to provide your school meals service? What are the benefits?

We think there is great potential for other communities to take control of their school meals services and create social enterprises to manage them. We have a vision of a network of school meals social enterprises across the UK, providing excellent quality school meals for children and young people, truly serving their school communities and applying profits in positive ways back into the school community.

Our model fits with current agendas such as Extended Schools and the Big Society. (Actually, we were way ahead of the Big Society! Whole School Meals was created from scratch in 2005 by a group of concerned local people volunteering their time; our Directors continue to volunteer their time and skills. We are sustainable, independent and self-determined.)

Our company is majority-owned by a group of schools. As majority shareholders, they have control of the company and can therefore ensure that we continue to provide a high quality of service. However, they are not burdened with the day-to-day management of that service

The driving force behind Whole School Meals is the desire to serve tasty, nutritious meals that have been prepared on-site from fresh ingredients, by skilled and trained staff, using as much local produce as possible. We use local suppliers and so are supporting our local economy, as well as providing a high quality service to our children and schools.

Although we have to be commercially successful and make a profit, we are not driven by the need to maximise that profit and distribute it to private shareholders. When we are ready to distribute profits (with sufficient reserves for growth and as a financial cushion), the schools will decide how it is used. So all the profit generated from the school meals service will come back into the school community.

Our journey was a difficult one, but we learned so much along the way and have created a viable model for a school meals provider social enterprise. Now we are ready to support others to create their own companies and realise the benefits. If you would like to talk to us about how you can set up your own school meals social enterprise, please contact us today.