The Horticultural Trades Association's fourth garden centre catering conference will take place on Thursday, February 28 at the Crowne Plaza, Birmingham NEC, and has been designed to epitomise best practice in the lucrative world of garden centre dining.
The line up of speakers includes managing director of Gails Bakery, Steven Whibley, who heads up an expanding chain of 12 cafe bakeries in London. Mr Whibley will be interviewed live by garden centre catering expert Salim Sajid of Blueberry Consulting to bring out invaluable tips for garden centre caterers.

Head of catering for London 2012 Olympic Games Jan Matthews will also share her story on how she procured, managed and delivered the atheletes' food throughout the games. The HTA said her story "will inspire anyone working in food and will demonstrate how the power of strong leadership and careful management can deliver just about anything!"

Blue Diamond managing director Alan Roper will also lend his voice on what the industry needs to do to provide inspirational catering in the future. The HTA's catering consultants Chris Brown of Turpin Smale and Nevil Stein of Ovation have been scouring the country to present practical and proven ideas that delegates can take away and apply in their cafe or restaurant. Mr Brown will be pulling in ideas from other sectors and Mr Stein will "drill down, using industry case studies, into detail of how to reduce costs and be more profitable."