The Future Food Awards
The Background
“The food industry is a hugely exciting place to be right now…it’s about time the brands revolutionising food and drink got their time in the spotlight.”
This is the view of Holly Shackleton, Editor of Speciality Food. She, along with Sue Nelson, founder of The FoodTalk Show, are the brains behind the Future Food Awards.
2019 saw them join forces for the first time to merge the established Speciality Food New Producer Awards and The FoodTalk Awards to offer the industry a pioneering awards scheme to benefit and promote both the companies at the heart of food and drink innovation.
And we were delighted to help them.
The Objectives
The Future Food Awards celebrate the new brands and innovations revolutionising the food and drink industry. They are designed to showcase those that have developed new products, processes or technologies that create exciting and sustainable solutions for producing, transporting or preparing food.
Brought to you by Speciality Food Magazine and The FoodTalk Show, they’re giving the most exciting businesses of today a step towards success, international recognition and money-can’t-buy contact with some of the food and drink industry’s most revered experts.
Our job was to generate excellent public relations and boost awareness of the Awards across the food and drink sector.
The Strategy
We developed a campaign of press releases, editorial and case studies to promote the Awards as an investment opportunity. We researched features and took advantage of relevant editorial opportunities to tell stories about previous winners and products. This also drew on the high-level panel of judges and industry Awards guests, including John Stapleton, Founder of New Covent Garden Soup Co., William Chase, Founder of Tyrrell’s Crisps, Monica Linton, Founder of Brindisa, Ollie Lloyd, Co-founder of Great British Chefs, and Russ Shaw, Former VP of Skype.
We also made good use of Speciality Food magazine editorial slots and used social media to support our endeavours and expand awareness of the Awards.
The Results
Each category finalist gets to pitch to the esteemed judges, gain their opinions and meet them at the drinks reception. They also win a trophy, feature on The FoodTalk Show as a guest, in Speciality Food magazine as well as other PR activity.
Thanks to our efforts, the Future Food Awards have become a well recognised event in the industry, with the PR helping to boost entry numbers and drive ticket sales.
“The quality of this year's finalists has been astounding, the Awards have been a massive success, giving new food and drink businesses ranging from small-scale producers to technology-driven innovators a chance to shine. We are looking forward to bringing back the Awards next year.”
Sue Nelson | Founder of The FoodTalk Show
