Aldeburgh Food & Drink Festival is one of the UK's most renowned food and drink festivals. Over 70 food and drink producers gather at Snape Maltings near Aldeburgh in September every year. They are joined by a panoply of well-known chefs and food writers to entertain an audience of nearly 10,000 over the weekend.
Polly worked with Aldeburgh Food & Drink Festival from 2009-2014 and was ultimately a member of the small board. During her time with the Festival Polly brought in her network of chefs and food writers to bring new faces like Diana Henry, Sabrina Ghayour and Sam Clark of Moro to the Festival. She also generated many new ideas to evolve and generate additional revenue for the Festival including workshops, a Saturday night ticketed party and brought new sponsors on board.
Polly was particularly passionate about the Festival Fringe which we think is unique amongst food festivals as a fortnight of tours, walks, talks, workshops and special events run by local farms, producers, retailers and pubs and restaurants.
The Fringe events give the public the chance to engage with local food production and support the local economy. When Polly took on managing the Fringe in 2009 the number of events went from about 25 to 60 with a much wider geographical spread across Suffolk and funding from local organisations.
