School Fetes and Sports Days: Choosing a Dessert Vendor

Catering for a school is not the same as catering for a party. The duty of care is higher, the scrutiny is higher, and the consequences of getting it wrong are considerably more serious.

Non-negotiables when choosing a vendor

1. FSSAI registration. Ask for the licence number and verify it. Any legitimate food business will provide it without hesitation.
2. A written allergen statement. Not a verbal assurance. You want it on paper, listing exactly which allergens are present and whether cross-contact can be excluded.
3. Staff hygiene and health documentation. Anyone serving children should have it.
4. Cold chain evidence. Frozen product must arrive frozen and stay frozen. Ask how, specifically.
5. Public liability insurance. Many schools require it as a condition; ask before booking rather than after.

The allergy question, taken seriously

At a school event you do not know every child’s medical history, and children do not always know or disclose their own. That changes the calculation.

Our recommendation for school events is to remove nuts from the topping bar entirely rather than to separate them. Separation is adequate for adults who can read signage and make their own decisions. It is not adequate when the customer is seven.

Any vendor unwilling to do this for a school event is telling you something useful about how they think.

Practical planning

• Queue management. Children queue enthusiastically and chaotically. Ask the vendor how they handle it; a rope line and one crew member on flow control makes a large difference.
• Cup size. Small, uniformly. It controls both sugar and mess.
• Position away from activities. A dessert counter beside a running track is a bad idea for several reasons.
• Shade and power. Both essential for an outdoor daytime event.
• Waste plan. Bins at the counter and at the exit, or you will find cups across the field.

Payment models

Three common approaches, each with its own logic:

• School pays, dessert is free to children. Simplest, best experience, and the school controls the cost by capping cup size.
• Token system. Tokens bought at a central desk, exchanged at the counter. Removes cash from the counter, which is a genuine advantage.
• Direct sale. Simplest for the school, but creates a divide between children who have money and children who do not, at an event that is supposed to be for everybody.

We would recommend one of the first two for a school event, for reasons that have nothing to do with catering.