History
The first British Food Fortnight was held in 2001 when the foot and mouth crisis had bought farming to its knees. Alexia Robinson, whose idea it was, wanted to do something to help revive rural communities and to give farmers a reason to continue to farm and look to the future with optimism.
British Food Fortnight was born out of her desire to get the public motivated to buy British food. The aim then, as it is now, is to use the fun of a national celebration to encourage people to actively seek out British food when they are shopping and eating out. If they enjoy doing so during British Food Fortnight then hopefully they will make a conscious effort to buy British year-round.
The inspiration was Harvest Festival, the traditional time when communities have gathered in the autumn for hundreds of years to celebrate the produce of the land. Indeed communities around the world have annual celebrations whether it is the rice harvest or wine.
Hence, British Food Fortnight takes place every year in the Autumn, in the last week of September and the first week of October; the traditional time of harvest festival.
Britain has had a national celebration of food for hundreds of years…Harvest Festival, which in years gone by was as much a part of the national calendar as Christmas and Easter. I wanted to create a modern day version that everyone could take part in.
British Food Fortnight was a success from day one. And today, with more and more individuals and organisations taking part, it is the leading national event championing British food.
The event is one of the most established food campaigns on the national calendar and has been used to drive sales and consumer awareness in major retailers and food service organisations (Tesco, SPAR, Budgens, Londis, John Lewis, Brakes and Sodexo to name a few). It has been acclaimed as ‘one of the highest profile awareness weeks’ by Marketing magazine.
In the days when print, radio and television coverage was the main PR armoury, the media campaign for British Food Fortnight sustained an audience reach of 300 million every year. We have enjoyed front page coverage in national newspapers, mentions in leader columns, a story line on The Archers and the dear late Terry Wogan exclaiming on his radio show “I wish every fortnight was British Food Fortnight”.