BEST FOOD FORWARD

FAR LEFT: Jack Rose started hauling coal from Chippenham train station to customers in the village of Bromham where he started a small market garden in the 19th century; the company later became Lovejoys LEFT: Neil Mortimer who represents the fourth generation of the family business has now been joined by his sons George and Ben

Feeding the locals

You might not have heard of Lovejoys, but it’s likely you will have eaten their produce –from fruit and vegetables to eggs, bread, herbs, cooking oil and ice cream –in those nostalgic times when you went out for a meal. Melissa Blease chats to Ben Mortimer, representing the fifth generation of the family business, about a more optimistic future

As the UK tentatively starts to venture out from Covidenforced hibernation, hospitality industry folk are keeping their fingers crossed that the light at the end of the tunnel shines brightly enough to send all notion of restrictions into the shadows. As we the public –hungry for eating (and drinking!) out again – dust the mothballs off our going-out clothes, news headlines, documentaries and social media threads continue to put hospitality business owners in the spotlight as questions around survival and support rightfully continue to dominate the menu.

But as has always been the case, there’s an unseen, often unsung army who have been struggling as much as those on the frontline throughout the fraught year we finally seem to be waving goodbye to. Without the local growers, producers and suppliers who underpin the foundations for the success of any contemporary restaurant or food business, there would literally be no food on the table for our coming out party feast – and long-established local produce specialist Lovejoys (based just up t'road from Bath, in Melksham) represents the cream of the food service crop.

“The last year has presented many challenges to Lovejoys, with the closure of the majority of our customers’ businesses for long periods at the forefront of the troubles we’ve endured,” says Ben Mortimer, who, alongside his brother George, works closely with their dad (and business founder) Neil to manage operations in what’s now a fifth-generation, family-run business.

“The open/shut, open/shut nature of the 2020 lockdowns precipitated extraordinary changes in trading patterns; during the Eat Out To Help Out scheme, for example, we were as busy as we would have been over any regular Christmas... and then it all stopped again. It’s really incredible, though, how resilient our customers –nearly all of whom are local, independent businesses –are. The chefs we work with have been inventive in founding new ventures and have remained positive, and our staff have been supportive throughout, responding and adapting brilliantly to the many changes we’ve had to make. Most of our team have been working over the past year but we’re really looking forward to welcoming everybody else back from furlough over the next few months, so finally things are starting to look up again!”

When it comes to the businesses that the Lovejoys team so diligently dig for, there’s a whole range of customers who rely on the Mortimer family’s services from five-star luxury hotels such as Lucknam Park to village shops and nursery schools, taking in pubs, museums, local food manufacturers and tiny cafés along the way. And the range of necessities that Lovejoys supply isn’t only farmed from great green growing stuff, either; there’s eggs and local dairy produce on the menu too (all sourced from farms in Wiltshire, Dorset, Devon and Somerset) alongside fresh bread, ice cream, herbs, cooking oil and all kinds of everything else in an everexpanding larder with plenty of storage for chilled and frozen foodstuffs too. Essential? It’s all there! And it’s all local, local, local.

“Bath Quinoa, Lacock Ice Cream, Wiltshire Duck Eggs, Bromham vegetables – we love local!” says Ben. “We also have a team that goes to Bristol Market three times a week to look for more exotic items or good deals – we like our customers to rely on us to source a rare product or send an emergency delivery. And that service didn’t stop throughout any of the lockdowns; we continued to deliver six days a week with no minimum order, adapting our product range and developing new methods of communication to connect with our customers even more than before,” says Ben. And a connection that wasn’t all and only about commerce made a big impact on our local community too. Lovejoys recently collaborated with The Longs Arms pub in South Wraxall to support the Kinder Kitchen initiative, providing free, vegetarian, freshly cooked meals to local people in need in Bath and West Wiltshire. “Many thanks to our drivers David and Nick who have volunteered their time to support us in that, too,” says Ben.

But let’s not forget that, while Covid ruled the waves, the UK went through further huge changes that, after all the In/Out/Shake-it-allabout furore, almost got kicked to the kerb. “Brexit? Oh, that!,” Ben laughs. “It’s funny how we were concerned about the impact of Brexit for years but then Covid came along and affected the hospitality side of the food industry in a much more serious way. In effect, we’ve encountered only minor changes to the importing of goods so far. But our ethos and priority is to source and promote local, British, seasonal produce anyway, which of course is unaffected.”

Sustainability is high on the agenda for the Lovejoys team too: solar panels on the warehouse keep Lovejoys’ lights on throughout most of the year, plastic packaging is kept to a minimum and recyclables are collected back from customers. “99% of our customers are within an hour’s drive of our base and we’re planning on moving our entire fleet to electric vans as soon as the technology is there for refrigerated vehicles,” says Ben.

So, taking all this into account: does the coolest food supply business in the UK happen to be right here, on our doorstep? “My father Neil’s experience as a grower and the personal contacts he forged with others in the region who have a real knowledge and passion for the industry remains of the greatest value to our business today, and the secret to any longstanding success we’re lucky enough to maintain,” says Ben.

“And right now, we really are lucky to be where we’re at, despite everything that’s been thrown at us this past year. We’re very optimistic about a busy spring and summer season for our customers, and thus our business too. And we want to grow! We’re really looking forward to working with new customers as the world starts opening up again – we supply a lot of nurseries and local junior schools but would love to work with more secondaries and independents in the area, for example, who often use national suppliers; we can supply their kitchens with produce grown just a stone’s throw away, which of course is more sustainable and invests money back into the local economy – and the very word Lovejoys should become synonymous with local.”

And so it came to pass that a business started by coal hauler-cummarket gardener Jack Rose over 150 years ago is today responsible for feeding many generations to come. Lovejoys: we love you! n