Educaterers Managing Director, Terry Tredget, to retire in May
Terry Tredget, the Managing Director of Warwickshire-based school catering company, Educaterers, which provides meals to many pupils in our Warwickshire family of schools, will be taking early retirement at the end of May.
Terry will be retiring back home to be closer to his family on the Essex / Suffolk coast, having decided to retire during the Covid-19 pandemic which, Terry says, has put several things into perspective. As such, Terry and his wife have decided the time is right for them both to retire.
Educaterers serve up over 120,000 nutritious tasty meals a week in over 200 schools, not only in Warwickshire, but also in Coventry, Birmingham, Leicestershire, and Oxfordshire.
The past 12 months have been challenging for all those involved in education service provision and, throughout the pandemic lockdowns, dedicated Educaterers staff continued to serve up meals to those children that attended school and to the staff supporting and caring for them.
Terry has written to all headteachers and business managers who are customers of Educaterers to inform them of this retirement and says: “I could not have made this decision without the quality team I have behind me, who have decades of combined experience in the school catering industry.
“They have my total confidence in their ability and dedication to continue to serve the needs of your schools and Academy Trusts.
“In fact, we are in the process of strengthening this relationship and support with the creation of three new Regional Contract Manager posts in our operational team.”
Terry took to helm at Educaterers in 2017, when the former Warwickshire County Caterers became Warwickshire County Council’s first Local Authority Traded Company (LATC).
Since then, the company has expanded to win and deliver more school catering contracts, both within the county and beyond Warwickshire’s borders.
In 2019, Educaterers was awarded the title of ‘Business of the Year’ by the Lead Association for Catering in Education (LACA), which recognises catering teams or organisations that have made an outstanding contribution to catering for schools in their local area and who continue to make a real difference to education catering.
Last year, the Educaterers catering team from Knightlow Primary School in Stretton-on-Dunsmore won the ‘Primary School Catering Team’ title in the LACA Awards for Excellence 2020, in recognition of their achievements in going ‘above and beyond’ to deliver school meals and more during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Under Terry’s leadership, staff development has been a big focus, with three Educaterers centres of excellence established at three individual schools in Warwickshire, in a secondary, junior and infant school, to further improve the cookery skills of Educaterers’ catering teams.
Over 75% of what Educaterers put on school dinner plates is homemade and the centres of excellence have enabled Educaterers to train both new and existing employees, as well as test new ideas in service and menu development.
In his message to headteachers and school business managers, Terry says: “I want to personally thank you for the trust that you have put in me and Educaterers, for which you have my sincere gratitude, and I look forward to the company continuing to enjoy a positive relationship with your schools and Academy Trusts.”
In December, the Educaterers Board commenced the search for Terry’s replacement and more news about that with be shared shortly – watch this space.
Terry’s replacement has many years of experience in the catering industry and Educaterers customers will be in good hands.
If you are an Educaterers customer and have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact your Contract Manager or email contactus@educaterers.co.uk.