Social Franchising
Nutritional evaluation & cost research
Concept, design, support & evaluation
Food Logistics, transport
Bag Preparation
320 meals/course
47 volunteer slots/course
Full Volunteer & training program
Cooking
Lesson
Outreach & participant support
We don’t just rock up and cook
What we offer
• Unique course design proven to change behaviours around cooking and eating, specifically designed for people in food poverty.
• Inspirational programme for both volunteers & students, enabling sustainability & high support levels through volunteering.
• Teaching aids and training from experienced teachers, incl. benchmarking & support
• “Course in a box” everything you need to deliver a course from start to finish including a comprehensive manual
• Access to discounted equipment
Be part of a movement • Consistent press and media presence – BBC, Delicious
Magazine, Observer Food Monthly, Vice Magazine, BBC Good Food Magazine, TV & film documentaries, local press - just some of the media coverage we’ve received
• Campaigning – engaging with DEFRA, GLA, politicians & a host of other food organisations on food poverty
• Expertise – as a leading organisation in the field of food poverty, we have the research at our fingertips. We are visiting lecturers at Bart’s Medical School (UK’s #1) on food poverty & health inequalities
• Communications – clear explanations of what is a complex intervention to help both funders and other partners understand impact and outcomes
“Course in a Box”
• 4 different, Public Health nutritionist approved courses to ensure continued engagement of volunteers and students – over 60 recipes available
• All recipes written to restaurant standard and fully tested; all costing less than £1 a portion
• All recipes and printed materials required for the course, including promotional materials
• All specialist materials e.g. custom made sachets of soya sauce, sesame oil, olive oil, coconut milk, spices, in the required quantities for each lesson
• Teaching aids and instructions for each lesson • Detailed food logistics systems to follow, to ensure
smooth and risk free ingredients bag production.
Continuous Development
• All franchisees and area heads are part of a network which ensures BoT continues to evolve based on feedback & new ideas.
• Full evaluation of every course means we identify when things are going well & learn from that, as well as avoiding similar issues
• Constant updating of recipes & teaching methods /teaching aids based on participant feedback
• Peer support network for Franchisees and area heads provides advice when encountering challenges (we’ve seen most of them before!)
Training
• Full and structured Onboarding programme
• On site training in real projects
• Access to highly experienced advice and support from both peers & HQ
• Full & comprehensive manual
• Specialist, detailed training videos
• Peer support network
• Videos and photos of all recipes
Areas of support
• Legal – running a food retail organisation
• Management (fundraising/design/advice)
• Managing & training a team of volunteers
• Bagging and food purchase
• Equipment – requirements and purchase
• Recipes – access to our £1 recipes
• Teaching aids including videos
• Student support during and post course
• Student recruitment
• Website
Legal Support
In selling £3 bags of food, we are a food retailer. Therefore Bags of Taste has to conform to all food retailing legislation including
• Food safety standards • Allergens & food labelling • Environmental Health
We provide expertise and know how in this area. In addition there are a range of other relevant
legislations e.g. Safeguarding vulnerable adults which we can advise on.
Management Support
• Advice on fundraising and the ability to use our proven outcomes across multiple locations as examples of what to expect
• Advice on how to write a good report to funders • Countdown to course – what to do when, who to
engage with and how • Highly detailed evaluation systems identify weaknesses
& strengths • Press & promotional advice • Appropriate examples for all the usual required
documentation e.g. Equal Opportunities Statement, Health & Safety Policies, Risk Assessments, Safeguarding policies
Volunteer support
• Complete guide to volunteer management
• Recruitment
• Co-ordination including online coordination tools
• How to retain and build community e.g. facebook groups, volunteers events
• promoting ex-students to volunteers
• Volunteer Training including training videos and online materials
• Volunteer co-ordination tools e.g. social media, scheduling tools
Bagging & Food purchase
• As we work with meat, both frozen and fresh, food logistics & food safety are paramount. We show you how to do this.
• Detailed spreadsheets for ordering the correct quantities of food
• Advice on sourcing food • Clear systems to follow to ensure accurate and safe,
hygenic bagging • Training materials for bagging volunteers incl videos • Provision of specialist bagging equipment, e.g. measuring
equipment for fast bagging • Provision of all spices and sauces required e.g. sachets of
soya sauce, olive oil • Provision of specialist packaging materials for each course
e.g ziplock bags, sauce tubs
Equipment
• Full inventory of all equipment required to run a full course and advice of where best to buy it (list runs currently to 53 individual items, around 300 in total)
• Access to trade discounts for some equipment like hobs (our price- £30 each, retail price - £60 each)
• Individual lesson equipment requirements (not all equipment is needed for every lesson)
• Systems to ensure that all equipment is accounted for
• Specialist equipment provided for bagging etc (small tubs, ziplocks, cable ties etc, sourced in bulk at head office)
• Discounted kitchen equipment (e.g. £1 chefs knives, 50p knife sharpeners, for students, sold at wholesale cost)
• Bags of Taste branded aprons for a professional touch
Recipe Support
• Individual recipes chosen to tailor to specific needs e.g. LOCAL ingredient availability, student dietary requirements, and appropriately paired with one other recipe each week
• Iconic, fully tested BoT recipes (“restaurant quality”) written in a specially designed, easy to read format to help students with literacy issues or learning difficulties
• Recipes covering 4 completely different courses, to keep the interest of volunteers
• All recipes cost less than £1 a portion to make at home (internal costing is 75p per portion)
• Recipes provided preprinted and prepared
Teaching Support
• Guide to teaching – highlighting key skills, common pitfalls, etc
• Videos and other illustrative materials for key skills/recipes e.g. chopping an onion
• Voice recordings for all recipes giving detailed information about recipe background, things to watch out for when teaching
• Videos for recipes you’ll be teaching
• Teaching flashcards for course level and individual recipes
• Lesson notes incl timings to ensure lesson runs smoothly
• Training sessions & videos – learn from a real hands on project or watch our detailed training videos
Student Support
• Access for students to student Facebook group which gives ongoing support and encouragement (see following page) – currently over 500 members
• Students are able to ask questions and get answers from a large number of experienced staff and volunteers
• They are able to post pictures of their cooking to get encouragement and tips – this also serves to encourage other students to try the same recipes
• Recipes are available for the students within the facebook group • Videos are available for recipes • Educational articles such as dietary advice etc are posted within this
group, by both students and staff • Access to low price equipment to be sold in lessons such as knives,
sharpeners, spice packs.
(Recipes)
(Recipes)
Student Recruitment
• Guides to how to recruit directly & through partners
• Access to nationwide partners like DWP
• Guidance on referral partners to contact
• Direct marketing materials – banners, flyers, posters using our branding, food photographs and designs.
• Advice on how to market on facebook / eventbrite / nextdoor and other social media sites (with provided marketing materials if required)
• Student attendance spreadsheet templates
• SMS reminder service with standard texts to send prior to lessons
Website support
• Website listed on all promotional materials
• Listings of your courses on our website and ability for students to register online
• Referral partners prefer to use our online form to refer
• Ability for potential partners & funders to peruse the website to understand the approach and see photos of existing successful operations, along with outcomes data.
• Students, partners and funders will feel more comfortable feeling the organisation is well established and proven
Finally: What you need to provide at your end
• Up front purchase of £1,300-1500 worth of equipment • Equipment storage and possibly transportation • Hall - a large hall with a sink (kitchen not required but useful, provided it is
NOT a catering kitchen) • Establishing and maintaining a significant volunteer team/volunteer
coordination • Outreach sufficient to fill classes of 15 participants for 4 weeks • Ingredients sourcing research • Liaison with council/GP services for referrals etc • Staff/volunteer time to purchase food and to make up ingredients bags
prior to lesson • Location for ingredients bagging • A fridge and freezer to store the food • Staff time to run the 2.5 hour lesson, plus an hour of set up/clear up time,
and transportation time