VEGPOWER: Persuading children to eat more vegetables

How you can make a difference to climate change

Vegetables are the major food group with the lowest environmental impact, and so eating more veg grown here in the UK really will help reduce our “carbon food-print”. You can help make a commitment to the planet by eating more veg as a family and giving your child our school lunch.

What we’re doing to play our part towards climate change

Building on our earlier pilot study that measured food waste during the Eat Them To Defeat Them campaign in a small amount of schools, in 2022, with help from some of our schools, we are going to measure food waste more methodically before, during and after the campaign. Pupils will become food waste champions and help us assess the difference in Co2 from plated food waste and packed lunch waste.

  • 45%
  • of families said their children are wasting fewer vegetables

How are we doing?

Some of our schools are weighing their school lunch food waste, including all plated food. See how this changes throughout the campaign.

HC3S really stands out as a beacon of excellence on children's health and an example to all of how a school caterer can play such a positive role in schools
Dan Parker – Chief Marketing Officer, VegPower

Years of eat your greens messages haven’t worked. This campaign champions families to improve long term health with a radical approach to the food children saw ‘boring’ on the plate. Children were on a mission to eat their vegetables by defeating them!

Each week our catering teams brought the campaign to life. We focused on a family favourite vegetable on our tasting table during lunch as well as on the menu. We rewarded children with stickers for tasting and they simply loved it!

Schools helped to bring it all together by:

  • holding veg assemblies
  • displaying veggie posters and decorations
  • using veggie lesson plans which we produced for schools to use up and down the country

Every child in a school taking part received a reward chart and sticker pack to take home. This would encourage them to continue to eat veg in their own environment too.

Corn cob leprechaun

Our family survey showed that children’s attitudes towards vegetables changed for the better.

  • 39%
  • agree that their child has wanted to eat a wider variety of veg
  • 68%
  • of parents believe their child is willing to try a wider variety of veg in their diet
He has been loving trying new foods.
Parent
Definitely made the effort to retry the ones she was not so keen on.
Parent
This was a positive experience for the children and the school and feedback was that children were trying and eating more vegetables at school and home. They were often heard repeating the catch phrases around school.
School