Catering Services Manager at Blackpool Council and Non-Exec Director for Love British Food
‘In conversation with…’ is a series of blog posts where we talk to inspirational people working in the world of food policy.
For this latest ‘In conversation with’, Rosie had the pleasure of speaking to Derek Wright, Head of Catering at Blackpool council Catering Services. With a career that began in sports and event catering before moving into the public sector, Derek now leads a large local authority service serving thousands of children every day across Blackpool.
Derek is deeply committed to simple, nutritious, scratch cooked food and to strengthening the connection between school meals, local communities and local supply chains. Through his leadership role and his wider work with Love British Food, he champions fairer, more accessible procurement and better support for SMEs, alongside sustained investment in the school food workforce.
We caught up with Derek to discuss what good school food looks like in 2025, the pressures facing public sector catering, and why local supply, skilled staff and community pride are central to the future of school meals.
Let’s start with what first drew you into the world of school food, and what has kept you passionate about improving food for children?
I started my career as a chef in Sports & Stadia & Events, but I wanted to move back up north to where my family and the friends were, so I went to work for my old college as an assessor/tutor for a few years before moving into managerial roles, first at an Army Barracks as Catering Manager for a year before I took the step into school catering – first as an Area Manager in 2015, moving into the position as catering manager in 2019.
I’m going to say it’s one of the most rewarding jobs because we know that school food and the work that we do has a massive impact on our young people and their future. The team care deeply about the young people we serve, and often go above and beyond, and that inspires me.
From your perspective, what does good school food look like in 2025, and why is it so important for local communities and the wider food system?
Good to me means that menus are simple, nutritious and a return to cooking from scratch. This involves training our workforce to feel confident moving away from ultra-processed foods and convenience products.
We need to be looking at trying to stabilise our communities. When we talk about school food, it’s really embedded within the wider community. Many of our staff live locally so they’re passionate about the work they do for local children. And as a local authority caterer, we’re invested in our town, that’s why we see our staff going over and above and doing a fantastic job.
When we look at the whole ecosystem of school food we can take it all the way back to our suppliers. We source much of our food locally, and our biggest supplier, Trevors Foodservice, also employ people from our local community. Community impact is really important; it goes hand in hand with the quality of what we serve. Plus, being a local authority means we’re already committed and passionate about the work that we do to make a difference in people’s lives.
Local and fairer procurement is something you champion, particularly in your role with Love British Food. What do you see as the most effective ways to bring more local, seasonal or sustainable food into school kitchens?
The key to everything is relationships. We have some fantastic relationships with local producers and suppliers who work very closely with our procurement team. Through the work with Love British Food you can see the impact it has on our buying across authorities and caterers.
I think procurement needs to be easier for SMEs to have opportunities to supply into local authorities. The procurement and the tendering process can be complicated and we need to be ensuring that we’re allowing SMEs to compete in supplying to us. Breaking down those barriers and actually looking at how frameworks are made-up to allow SMEs to gain access can pay dividends; it gives us access to seasonality it allows us to start working with our supply chain a little bit more.
What are the biggest pressures facing school and public-sector caterers right now, and where do you think national or local policy could make the biggest difference?
I think there’s some huge challenges for school catering and I think we’ve lost sight that school food is an investment. It can make savings down the line when we talk about health, but funding within England is just not enough. Policymakers need to be thinking about reformulating the funding model and how it works for schools and caterers. Food prices have gone up. Staffing costs have gone up. Energy costs have gone up. There was no real margin in school meals anyway, and now it’s having significant impact. We are expected to meet high nutritional standards, manage allergens, and source sustainably, all within tight budgets.
I think one my biggest concerns is the fragmentation of the workforce. We are losing skilled people. We need to consider how those staff are trained and how we invest in catering as a career. When you think about the future, we need to be bringing younger people into the services, training them to be managers and area managers who can deliver the future of school food.
Whose work in the food system do you look to for inspiration or fresh thinking?
Oh, there’s so many people – Alexia Robinson at Love British food, who’s very passionate and about local sourcing, ensuring schools have access to farm visits and just that whole work of Love British Food is very inspiring.
I also draw quite heavily on the work of Chefs in Schools, led by Naomi Duncan. It’s bridging that gap between skills that we would use in hospitality catering over into the public sector and school food. And it’s an empowering sort of learning – for the school pupils and for our staff, immersing them into the whole foodie world.
Also Jayne Jones, and her work through the Public Sector Catering Alliance. Jayne is a great leader and certainly has united all the dots across public sector and the whole industry.
Closer to home, I’m inspired by my team and their hard work across the service. They start off those early shifts at 7:00 in the morning and we know that school food is going to start getting served at 11:30, no matter what challenges have been thrown at us that day. My team are very inspiring and I think that’s what keeps me here, doing what we do and developing school meals to make a difference.
We always finish on what’s for dinner, what’s for dinner on a Monday night in winter for you?
Well, it’s pretty cold up north. So tonight I’ve put a little bit of braising steak in the slow cooker. We’re going to have that with some mash tonight. A proper northern dish!