A new supplier pitch is a polished thing. It will include a glossy menu, claims about EYFS compliance, and someone enthusiastic on the phone. What it won't include: the three things you actually need to know before you sign anything.
Start With the Brief, Not the Shortlist
Most nursery managers approach supplier selection backwards. They collect a few names from word of mouth, request menus, and make a decision based on price and whether the food looks nice. This is how you end up repeating the process in eighteen months.
Before you speak to a single supplier, write a brief. One page is enough. It should cover:
- Your numbers. How many children, across which age groups, on which days. If this varies by session, say so. A supplier who can't handle fluctuating covers is going to be a headache.
- Your compliance requirements. The September 2025 EYFS nutrition guidance is now the baseline. You need a supplier who can demonstrate their menus against the "provide, limit, avoid" framework and the Caroline Walker Trust nutritional guidelines. Add any specific allergen protocols your setting requires.
- Your operational constraints. Kitchen facilities, delivery windows, storage capacity, whether you need hot meals delivered or ingredients for in-house preparation. These aren't secondary considerations — they're the framework everything else has to fit inside.
- Your budget. A real number, not a vague instruction to be "cost-effective." Suppliers pitch to the budget they think you have. Give them the actual figure and see what they come back with.
Write this down before you make any calls. It filters out unsuitable suppliers before they've taken up an hour of your time.
The Shortlisting Questions That Actually Matter
When you speak to suppliers, most of their pitch is marketing. Your job is to get past it. These are the questions that separate suppliers worth considering from suppliers worth politely ending the call with.
"Can you show me your menus mapped against the DfE's September 2025 nutrition guidance?"
Not: "Do you meet EYFS requirements?" Every supplier will say yes. You need to see the evidence. A compliant supplier can produce an allergen matrix, show you which foods fall into their "provide, limit, avoid" categories, and demonstrate portion sizes against the age-specific DfE guidance. If they send you a menu PDF with no supporting analysis, ask again. If the second answer is also a menu PDF, move on.
"What is your current FSA food hygiene rating and where can I verify it?"
The correct answer includes a rating of 5 and the URL of the FSA public database where you can check it directly. Not a screenshot. Not their word for it. The FSA database at food.gov.uk is publicly searchable. Any supplier confident in their rating will point you there without being asked.
"Walk me through how allergen information reaches the member of staff serving food to my children."
This is the question most managers don't ask. A good answer describes a live system — per-meal, per-child, updated in real time when requirements change. A poor answer describes a document. Allergen failures in early years settings carry serious consequences. A laminated matrix in a folder is not a safeguard. If their answer involves a binder, keep looking.
"What happens if you can't deliver?"
Every supplier will have a contingency answer. What you're listening for is specificity. "We'd let you know as early as possible" is not a contingency. A genuine answer involves timelines, alternatives, and a track record of how often and why it's happened. Suppliers who have never missed a delivery have either not been operating long enough or aren't being honest.
Red Flags in a Supplier Pitch
Some things are worth noting when they come up. Others should end the conversation.
They lead on price. A supplier whose primary pitch is cost-competitiveness is telling you where their margins are. Cheap nursery catering is cheap somewhere. Usually in ingredients, staff competency, or compliance infrastructure. Price is a consideration. It's not a qualification.
They claim compliance without evidence. "We're fully EYFS compliant" is a marketing statement. "Here's how our menus map against the DfE guidance, and here's our allergen management protocol" is a compliance statement. These are different things.
Their allergen matrix is static. If a supplier provides allergen information as a printed document that's updated quarterly, or whenever someone remembers, that's a risk. Allergen information needs to be current at every single service. A supplier without a live system for this is a liability.
They can't answer questions about the Caroline Walker Trust guidelines. The Caroline Walker Trust's Eating Well for Under 5s in Child Care is the sector's primary nutritional reference for early years settings. It predates the 2025 EYFS guidance and is cited by Ofsted. A supplier who provides nursery food professionally should know it. Blankness when you mention it tells you something.
The contract protects them, not you. More on this below.
What to Check Before You Sign
Supplier contracts in this sector are written by suppliers. Read them with that in mind.
Minimum order commitments. What happens in school holidays, when numbers drop significantly? Some contracts lock you into minimums that don't reflect your actual usage. Get the holiday and low-occupancy position in writing before you sign.
Notice periods. The standard is between four and twelve weeks. Twelve weeks is long. If the supplier is confident in their service, they shouldn't need three months to hold you in place. Push back.
Price variation clauses. Most contracts include a mechanism for price increases, usually tied to inflation indices. Check the frequency, the cap, and the notice period. A contract that allows unlimited price increases with four weeks' notice is a problem waiting to happen.
Liability for allergen incidents. This needs to be explicit. If a child has an allergic reaction because allergen information provided by the supplier was incorrect or not communicated, where does liability sit? Your contract should be clear. If it isn't, ask for clarity before signing. If the supplier is reluctant to provide it, treat that as a red flag.
In-House Cooking vs. External Catering: The Actual Decision
Settings often frame this as a philosophical question. It isn't. It's an operational one. Here's how to think about it.
In-house cooking gives you control. You know exactly what's in the food, you can adapt on the day, and parents appreciate it. The cost is staffing, training, kitchen maintenance, compliance management, and the time it takes to do all of that well. If your kitchen lead leaves, that cost spikes immediately.
External catering gives you predictability. A good supplier handles menu planning, nutritional compliance, allergen management, and delivery logistics. You pay a per-head rate and you know what you're getting. The risk is supplier dependency — and the quality of what you're dependent on.
Most settings that switch from in-house to external catering do so because the staffing cost of doing it well in-house is higher than it first appears. Most settings that switch back do so because they chose a supplier on price rather than competence.
There is no objectively correct answer. There is the answer that's right for your specific setting, your team, your kitchen, and your budget. The decision is worth spending time on. Picking a supplier to fix an in-house staffing problem, or switching to in-house to cut costs, usually creates a different problem rather than solving the original one.
Building a Shortlist
Four suppliers is enough for a serious comparison. More than that and you're generating admin rather than making a decision.
For each shortlisted supplier, you want:
| What to get | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Menus mapped against DfE 2025 guidance | Evidence of EYFS compliance, not just a claim |
| Current FSA hygiene rating (verified) | Baseline food safety due diligence |
| Allergen management protocol, in writing | How they handle the highest-stakes risk in your setting |
| Sample contract, reviewed before any site visit | Reveals commercial terms before you're invested in the relationship |
| Two references from comparable settings | Settings of similar size, similar age range, similar operating model |
| Pricing broken down by age group and service | So you're comparing like for like across suppliers |
References are the step most managers skip because they feel time-consuming. Don't skip them. A single conversation with a nursery manager who has used this supplier for eighteen months will tell you more than any pitch. Ask them: what's the supplier like when something goes wrong?
Where to Find Suppliers Worth Shortlisting
Word of mouth is a reasonable starting point. Regional Facebook groups for nursery managers, networks through NDNA or the Early Years Alliance, and local authority contacts are all worth tapping.
For a more systematic search — particularly if you want suppliers who have already been assessed for EYFS compliance and food hygiene standards — the Nurture Kitchen website lists nursery catering suppliers by region, category, and verification status.
Browse Nurture Kitchen's nursery supplier listings — filtered by region, category, and compliance level.
The Bottom Line
Choosing a nursery food supplier is a procurement decision with compliance, financial, and safeguarding implications. Treat it like one.
Brief first. Shortlist on evidence, not pitch quality. Ask the questions most managers don't ask. Read the contract before you're emotionally invested in the relationship. Check references.
And verify the FSA rating yourself. Every time.