Café Sunlight to join east London social enterprise food quarter

Social enterprise Café Sunlight has just announced a deal with fellow social enterprise CAN Mezzanine which will see the former provide a lunch and catering service across three office blocks in London.

Café Sunlight will not only cater to the third sector organisations that occupy the CAN Mezzanine offices but also use its new kitchen facilities in Old Street to launch a culinary assault on the capital and expand its events catering business.

Sunlight CEO Peter Holbrook said: 'We're just around the corner from Fifteen and The Hoxton Apprentice so it seems that in that part of east London we're creating a social enterprise food quarter!'

The new service, called Café Sunlight in a Can, is set to start in the new year with an initial team likely to be made up of five or six regular employees and ten trainees.

'We're very keen to provide CAN's third sector residents with a healthy social enterprise lunch and social enterprise Cafédirect coffee made by trainees who would be otherwise marginalised from the employment market,' said Holbrook.

He said the base in London for events catering had been recommended by Café Sunlight's corporate partner Sony.

'Sony said to us, you've got a fantastic product, you need to be in London because there's a bigger market, particularly for events.

'This has also cemented our relationship with CAN, which has been a real force for good in our development.'

www.cafesunlight.org.uk