The awards are open to individuals, teams, companies and organisations operating in a public sector environment. There are 17 categories that are available for nominations alongside the Armed Forces Caterer of the Year Award and the Lifetime Achievement Award that do not require nominations.
Please ensure you have read the entry criteria thoroughly and answered the questions related to the award you’d like to enter, within the 500 - 1,000 word limit. It is this document that will convince the judges of their worthiness to win the award. You can also include supporting material such as testimonials, menus, CVs, and photos.
The Catering College Award is open to individuals, teams or organisations that have provided inspirational courses and delivered exceptional results. They should be able to demonstrate how students have been helped and inspired into careers in hospitality and how they have supported students in achieving their aims. Judges are looking for supporting evidence of:
- Strong academic results from the last graduating students.
- Details of any relevant extra-curricular activities, visits and workplace experience.
- Testimonials from students and local businesses who have benefitted from the colleges courses and graduates.
The Contract Caterer of the Year Award is for the top-performing company (Ltd or PLC) supplying outsourced catering and support services to the public sector in either a specific area or across the whole sector. Judges are looking for contractors that have excelled in all the important areas of commercial activity.
This may include outstanding business performance, the successful move into new sectors, the introduction of education and training schemes, the development of new concepts and value-added support, delivering improvements in health and wellbeing, completion of modernisation programmes, significant growth or change strategies, or a combination of any of these.
For the University Catering Award the judges are looking for an individual, team, or organisation that has had a major influence on the provision of foodservice to students and/or the development of commercial catering operations in a university.
The category is open to in-house and outsourced operations. The provision of a sustainability policy is hugely important, while recognition of customer trends and a creative approach should also be evident.
In addition to these three awards categories there are 11 more open for nominations before the deadline, including:
- Care Catering Award
- Catering Manager of the Year Award
- Chef of the Year Award
- Education Catering Award
- Health and Nutrition Award
- Hospital Catering Award
- Innovation Award
- Marketing Award
- Prison Catering Award
- Special Contribution Award
- Sustainability Award
- Team of the Year Award
- Training and Apprenticeship Award
- Unsung Hero Award