F&D Heroes Issue 1

Bread & Jam 2.0: The UK’s First Food
Founders’ Festival Goes Virtual
On top of the educational program, there were also
pitching opportunities with the top retailers, Dragon’s
Den style investor pitching and the opportunity to
interact and network with any other delegate or
speaker in private 1:1 meetings.
“‘Our platform recreates many of the networking
aspects of real life events and going virtual is an
incredible opportunity to extend our support to a much
wider audience across the UK and Europe” says Bread &
Jam Co-founder Tara Mei.
Since 2016 the Bread & Jam Festival has been the “go
to” event for anyone wanting to start or grow a food or
drink business.
The annual conference for challenger brands pulls
together the biggest names in food and drink, from
successful entrepreneurs to high-street retailers and
industry investors. And, in spite of the turmoil caused
by COVID-19, this year was no different.
“We’ve been running a physical, real-life annual
conference, and lots of smaller events throughout the
year, for many years now but following lockdown we
had to quickly pivot to provide all of our support online.
The industry has needed our support more than ever
and so, since late March, we have run over 100 online
workshops and panels, many of them free to join.
And they’ve been attended by over 7,000 food & drink
brand owners and industry experts from across the
UK, Europe, USA, Asia, Australia and South America”
according to Bread & Jam Co-founder Jason Gibb.
Clearly lockdown has not slowed the enthusiasm for
starting a food business, and so Bread & Jam’s annual
conference ran virtually, on a cutting-edge digital
platform, from the 19 th to the 22 nd October 2020.
This 4-day event brought the usual mix of capability
training, peer-to-peer knowledge sharing and
networking to the next generation of food and drink
challenger brands. At its heart was the keynote talks
from some of the biggest names in food and drink,
workshops run by industry experts, and founder and
retailer panels covering every aspect of building a
food business.
Each year, dozens of brands secure listings following
their pitches at Bread & Jam, and this year will be no
exception. “Bread & Jam is one of my favourite events
of the year. We are often the launchpad retailer for UK
start-ups or brands entering the UK for the first time,
so I go anywhere that I am likely to find new, innovative
food and wellness brands. There is nowhere better
than Bread & Jam for that,” says Al Overton who is
Head of Buying at Planet Organic.
Producers love it too. “We didn’t expect things to move
so quickly after Bread & Jam, but Planet Organic liked
the product so just two weeks after the festival we were
supplying the market” says founder Alexandria Davies.
Ishen Paran
Oatly
Speakers included:
Ben Greensmith
Tony’s
Chocolonely
Jo Whitfield
Co-op
In the next few pages, we delve deeper into some
of the most exciting entrepreneurial stories, from a
couple of our favourite keynote speakers at Bread &
Jam 2.0. From the lighbulb moment in marketing Oatly,
to the dark truths enveloping the chocolate industry.
Buckle up, you’re in for one hell hell of a ride.
breadandjamfest.com
@breadjamfest
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