Our Story

Love British Food is the leading national campaign promoting British food.

Our aim is to encourage people to seek out British food when they are shopping or eating out and in doing so to discover the delights of the diverse and delicious food produced in Great Britain. We want to create a vibrant domestic market for British food that gives farmers and food producers the confidence to invest and develop their businesses because they will see that there is a demand for their produce.

We are a small, independently funded organisation run by people with a passion for food and the beautiful British countryside that produces it. 

Hundreds of organisations – some very large, many very small - work together under our umbrella; as a result, though we are a small organisation, we punch way above our weight.

We pride ourselves on being grassroots driven, rooted in communities around the country. Our activities started in 2002 with twelve community groups around the country led by parish leaders. People who care about British food in their communities, whether it is a teacher in a school, a chef in a hospital or the organiser of a food festival or market…they are Love British Food’s lifeblood. It is due to their passion and ingenuity that we are able to achieve real change in the areas we work in. We are, therefore, very different from other more PR-driven campaigns.

We are unique also in that, in a world where the promotion of a clear Buy British message from the Government is prohibited by state aid rules, we are the leading organisation advocating a strong ‘Buy British Food’ message. And the only organisation working with those responsible for sourcing food in our schools, hospitals and other public sector organisations to make British food their preferred supplier of choice.

Love British Food was founded in 2002 by Alexia Robinson, a Dorset girl fuelled by a passion for the rural life she enjoyed as a child.

I’m a country girl and care passionately about the British countryside and rural way of life. My mantra is – no sheep, no cows, no countryside. If we don’t buy British and support our farmers, it won’t be long before we don’t have any farms, have to rely much more on imported foods of questionable quality and the countryside will become a rural theme park.

The catalyst was the Foot & Mouth crisis that had bought the countryside to its knees. There were numerous food initiatives, projects and events taking place across Britain at that time but there was no overall flagship campaign to bring them to the public’s attention.


The focal point of our activities is British Food Fortnight, the national celebration of our food that takes place every Autumn in the last week of September and the first week of October, at the same time as Harvest Festival, the traditional time for celebrating our food. The Fortnight is now established annually as the biggest national celebration of British food. Hundreds of activities and food promotions take place during it every year. Nearly every part of British life gets involved: schools, hospitals, care homes, universities, sports venues, visitor attractions, pubs, restaurants, hotels, high street shops and, in some instance, entire cities, towns and villages. We hope that, over the years, you will have enjoyed the celebrations in some way in the community that you live in.


We have wonderful Ambassadors, many of whom are household names, Food Hero Members and Partners. We work with inspiring young farmers who we promote as the best advert for British food. We pride ourselves on inclusivity; the smallest community organisation is as important a part of our activities as the largest commercial organisation. We are an umbrella under which we hope people and organisations will benefit from being under; and we want everyone to feel that Love British Food is ‘their campaign’ not ‘ours’.

All our activity has started from the grassroots up. 

In retail, we started by running promotions, food tastings and meet the producer instore activities with members of the Guild of Fine Food Retailers and the Q Guild of Butchers. These increased sales in the participating outlets by 50 – 80%. Medium sized retailers took notice; Budgens and Londis came on board and use the campaign to promote their support of local food. And then the supermarkets put Love British Food on their promotion calendars. Tesco, Morrisons and Asda have all used our branding; and on the high street, SPAR and the Co-op have worked under our umbrella.

Similarly, in food service, we started by running menu promotions with small independent restaurants that were members of Les Routiers. These increased menu sales and bought in new customers. So the pub groups took notice and took part: Fullers, Mitchells and Butler, Enterprise Inns and Whiting and Hammond. And then the food service sector joined the party. Led first by Aramark and Compass and more recently led by Sodexo, Brakes, Harrison Catering, ISS Food Service, Cucina and ESPO. Our activities now cross the whole spectrum of private and public food service. We are proud in particular of our role in promoting British food as first supplier of choice across the public sector: in schools, hospitals, care homes and universities.

A word about price. We know that British food is often a more expensive choice. We think that, when buying food, value for money is more important than price. Similar to when you buy a car, you do not seek out the cheapest car but the one that offers the best value. The values that so much of British food is produced to are what we want to get you excited about; British food that is sustainable, produced to high animal welfare standards, environment enhancing, regionally distinct, has a rich heritage; is diverse, seasonal and delicious.

Our website has advice on producing, buying and eating British, with information for you the consumer as well as a trade section for retailers and caterers and an education area for teachers. We hope you enjoy it, find it useful and are inspired to buy British food!

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