ESS has partnered with Mackie Academy to deliver the Voyagers initiative, a creative, skills-focused programme that sees members of the company’s management and culinary teams working with school pupils to design and market a new street food concept.
The programme challenges S3 students to develop a contemporary street food offer, reflecting the growing popularity of the format and the wide range of cuisines and styles it encompasses. Participants are required to consider consumer appeal, ingredient costs, pricing, presentation and packaging, alongside developing marketing collateral to promote their ideas.
Students present their concepts to peers and a judging panel made up of ESS senior managers and culinary leads, explaining the thinking behind their decisions. The initiative has been designed collaboratively to support the development of key elements of students’ school leaver profiles, including creativity, innovation, teamwork and problem solving.
Now in its second year, Voyagers has already produced a number of winning concepts, including the ‘Bite and Beyond’ wrap and the ‘Poke and Roll’ sushi idea.
The most recent winning group, Scarlett, Amy, Matt and Jacob, who created ‘Bite and Beyond’, said:
“It was amazing to be given the opportunity to work collaboratively and have all our hard work recognised by ESS. We learned how important it is to plan thoroughly and listen to each other’s ideas. We chose our idea after doing a lot of research and realising that one meal wouldn’t suit everyone, so having a customisable menu with different options gave people the freedom to choose what they wanted. Being chosen as a winning group felt really rewarding and made our efforts feel worthwhile.”
Megan Douglas, Business & Community Support Officer at Mackie Academy, commented:
“Mackie Academy is delighted to mark the second successful year of our partnership with ESS as part of our Voyagers course. We’re incredibly grateful to their team for their continued support, inspiration and real-world insight – and we couldn’t be prouder of our pupils for their enthusiasm, creativity and hard work in bringing their ideas to life.”
Ronnie Kelman, Managing Director – ESS Energy, Government & Infrastructure, added:
“We’re delighted to be working with Mackie Academy on the Voyagers initiative, building on the great partnership we’ve developed through delivering the Snackie Mackies project. As well as asking the students to create a contemporary street food concept, we task them with producing exciting marketing collateral and presenting their ideas to our senior team – we hope these skills will help them in their future academic and work careers. It’s a brilliant opportunity to support the next generation and I’m proud that our team are embracing it!”
