Pizza Van Hire in County Durham

LittleBritaly, specialist wood fired pizza caterers, can travel anywhere in the UK for your event. Here they share their most memorable booking so far as well as some handy tips on what to look for when booking a stone-baked pizza caterer for your event.

What do you need to know from an organiser in order to provide a comprehensive quote?

In order to provide a quote to a customer, ideally we need to know the date to make sure we have availability (our calendar fills up quickly, we already have bookings for 2018), the location (a postcode really helps), the number of guests expected and the type of cuisine they would like serving, we can do much more than wood-fired pizza.

What advice would you give to a customer looking to hire a provider in your area of work?

Experience counts, as does quality, reliability and customer service, in eight years of trading we have not been late to an event once.

We always travel to within 10 miles of any wedding reception, party or corporate event the evening before and stay overnight in a local hotel, make sure your supplier does the same (all it takes is a puncture or breakdown to spoil your big day).

All equipment should be like new and support vehicles must have fridges and freezers fitted and all suppliers should be self sufficient in terms of power requirements.

Customer service is also paramount, we, for example, are contactable 7 days a week and all our booking forms are available for clients to see from the day they book.

It's also important that you make sure you're dealing with a reputable company, that they are registered with their local health authority (a legal obligation) and have full public liability insurance. The last thing you want is to have someone turn up with dirty, old equipment, no cooling facilities, who's trading illegally and has no insurance.

Finally, if a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is, so ask yourself why and at least ask the provider why.

Please tell us a little bit about how and why you started the business.

I started this business in 2008 after spotting an opening in the mobile catering market (something I'd been involved in for over twenty years), there were plenty of burger vans etc, but hardly anybody serving pizza.

Since then the market has grown massively, we're now the market leaders in supplying hire ovens and the ovens we hand build in our small factory are used by dozens of operators throughout the country.

We still love travelling around the UK serving pizza and nobody knows pizza ovens quite like us and are still introducing new ideas. This year we've introduced "DIY Pizza" where we supply all the ingredients and tools to cook your own pizza and are currently developing a 1.5metre oven as well (the first one should be ready by mid April).

Please tell us about a booking you've had through Add to Event, how did it go? Would you recommend us to others?

We've met hundreds of fantastic people through Add to Event but I suppose the most memorable booking we've had is also the saddest, a lady contacted me one day, her brother had passed away unexpectedly and she needed someone to serve his favourite food, pizza, at his wake.

We did our best to make sure that the wake was something that the guests could look back on with fond memories, even though it was a sad occasion. It is something I certainly won't ever forget, especially the touching ceremony where the guests burnt letters in our oven that they had written to the deceased.

I would certainly recommend Add to Event to others, it has helped our business grow.