F&D Heroes Issue 1

Welcome & about us
Welcome to the first edition of Food and Drink Heroes, a publication to
accompany a new awards programme aimed to shine a spotlight on, and
champion some of the UK’s most exciting food and drink brands.
Our entire business is built on celebrating entrepreneurs. First through the
Great British Entrepreneur Awards (which has now grown into the largest
celebration of entrepreneurship in the UK), and now, excitingly, also via
Food & Drink Heroes.
We’ve launched Food & Drink Heroes because we were positively
overwhelmed with such high quality applications from so many extraordinary
food and drink businesses via The Great British Entrepreneur Awards.
Coupled with the fact that the food and drink industry is the UK’s largest
manufacturing sector, contributing £31.1bn to the economy annually and
employing 450,000 people, we felt that these entrepreneurs needed their
own stage. A stage in which we could tell their entrepreneurial stories;
the twists, turns and events in their lives that have led them to disrupting,
challenging and creating businesses that feed, indulge and nourish us.
We believe that entrepreneurs are as much about their story as they are
their balance sheet, and in a world where it feels like consumer values and
ethics are stronger than ever, these stories are increasingly important, and
we want to showcase them.
This magazine will introduce you to brands and entrepreneurs that you
may recognise but, know little about the founder and their journey. It
will also put brands and products on your radar that you might not have
yet come across, and that’s what this publication (and in fact our entire
programme) strives to achieve.
All of the brands featured in this publication (and future editions) have a
real person driving the business; overcoming obstacles, striving for sales
and in many cases doing so with bundles of purpose. So many of these
entrepreneurs have shown us that a sustainability policy is beginning to
become a happy ‘given’; whether that’s by innovating new eco-friendly
alternatives or ingraining a broader human commitment to sustainability
at their businesses core.
A new global study by Xero has recently revealed the extent to which the
UK values its small businesses, highlighting the depth of goodwill and the
strength of society’s dependence on them since Covid-19. So use this
publication to discover, follow, share and shop with some of Britain’s most
exciting food and drink brands.
Let’s fill our fridges, cupboards and bellies with goods from independent
producers, traders and specialists and become part of their stories.
If you’d like any further information about Food & Drink Heroes or would
like to be featured in the next issue of the magazine, please get in touch:
Hannah@foodanddrinkentrepreneur.com