Old Skool Bus & Kitchen – Supplier Spotlight

When Old Skool Bus & Kitchen rock up for your wedding you immediately add visual impact! And the food that comes out of that kitchen is superlative. All the directors and staff are friendly and very helpful to help your day go off brilliantly. Want to get to know more about them? Read on for Kate’s answers to my questions!

 

Name

Kate Packham (one of 3 directors)

Business Name

Old Skool Bus & Kitchen

Area you cover

Sussex, Surrey, Kent & Hampshire (plus major festivals!)

Any awards you’ve won?

We’re a young company in terms of our business, but it was actually off the back of an award from the Mayor of the City of Brighton & Hove that the business was born!!

It came about in early 2020 lockdown when the three of us friends, (Wendy, Sean and Kate) were working together on a charity and community COVID19 support project. Wendy set up an emergency kitchen at Exeter Street Hall in Hove with a team of volunteers, including Sean. I used to donate crates and pallet loads of ‘seconds’ vegetables from a veg box delivery company. I took a job with the veg box company when the events industry collapsed overnight.

The Exeter Street Hall emergency kitchen produced and delivered thousands of meals to vulnerable people in their homes. This was done through various charities and the local council. Wendy and the team at the kitchen won a “Mayor’s Covid-19 Community Champions Award” for the support efforts. It was from this teamwork that the three of us decided to buy the food truck and try to continue to deliver several charitable projects a year with it!

Describe the Old Skool Bus style

Being a festival food truck our culture and food is fun, full of flavour, colourful, nutritious and affordable! For weddings we serve street food style canapés in a friendly and casual manner. At lunch we do buffets and family style sharing banquets with dessert tables. Then in the evening we add to the party vibe by serving festival style food from the American school bus food truck. Everybody loves this!

What makes it easier is that we are licensed to run bars too. This means that we are able to cater for every aspect of your hospitality needs across the whole day and evening. Our team have even camped overnight twice and Great Betley Farmhouse for weddings. This meant that we were there to serve full English breakfasts, American Hash, and hot drinks in the morning to the party campers!

(Here are some photos to whet your appetite before reading the rest of the Qs&As!)

How did you get into your business and what inspired you?

Other than the charity projects together, all three of us had careers in hospitality, catering & events. So it was more of a case of Wendy and Sean as chefs coming together with me in event management, and our joint passion for DELICIOUS food! We all love cooking and love eating even more! We’ve had a lot of fun (and calories) trialling and testing our grilled sourdough toasties, gourmet burgers, and everything else on the way!

What do you like about working at Great Betley Farmhouse?

The beauty of Great Betley Farmhouse is that it’s so private. It’s totally set back in the countryside and surrounded by scenery and nature. The fields are a perfect setting for a wedding or small festival as you have the entertainment field and a separate campsite. However, it’s Kim that is the heart and soul of the venue. Her passion for seamless events, and her care about the wedding couples experience is really unique.

At Great Betley Farmhouse we encourage sustainability and being environmentally friendly. How does your business support this ethos?

Our ethical values all round, especially for sustainability, the environment and minimal food wastage is embedded in any event we deliver. Whether it’s a not-for-profit charity project, a wedding or a commercial street food pitch at Glastonbury Festival. We ensure all our suppliers provide the best products and food to fulfil this ethos. Also we are always looking out to improve as things evolve.

We have just won the tender to deliver the crew catering contract for Green Gathering Festival 2023. This is the original Off-Grid festival and this is hugely exciting for our team! With only being supplied with minimal solar power for lighting we are looking at ways we can deliver a catering service with a much lower carbon footprint and waste. This development can then be learned from to carry elements through our operational policies going forward.

What advice would you give to couples to help them plan and enjoy their celebration?

The two key things we would recommend for catering on a wedding day are:

1. Ensure you serve some kind of nibbles or canapés on arrival. Often guests will have skipped breakfast in favour of getting ready. Or the wedding party will have had big day nerves, plus might have had a couple of drinks already on the way! A little food at this point goes a long way in keeping energy levels up and tipsy levels down!
2. Choose the menu that YOU both want and love! This is YOUR big day and the style of service and food should represent you as a couple. We cater for all dietary requirements. So if you have children and elderly guests who require a special meal then we can discuss including this in your quote. No Problem!

So there you have it – Old Skool Bus & Kitchen, all round amazing people and food. And excellent advice from Kate, who really knows her stuff. She’s been very modest about her experience in events and works tirelessly to make events great. I can also confirm that the sourdough toasties are out of this world – perfect for the evening munchies!

Check out our Suppliers We Love page for more vendors to help with your event.

Happy Planning!