We’ve been working with Banner Foods for long enough that they trust us to choose the plates.
That might sound like a small thing. But in food photography, the decision about what the food sits on, what surrounds it, how the colours of the tableware relate to the colours of the dish — these are significant creative decisions that shape the final image. When a client trusts you enough to make those calls without having to sign off every detail, it’s a sign that the relationship has reached a genuinely productive level.
Banner Foods are based in Bromsgrove — a food service provider with roots going back to 1906, when Samuel Banner founded the original butcher’s shop. Today they supply ready meals and catering services to pubs, hotels, restaurants and corporate events. We’ve photographed their range over many years, and recently worked with them on seven new dishes they were adding to their ready meal menu.
The brief
The images needed to do two things: attract end consumers through the Banner Foods website, and persuade decision-makers at catering establishments — pubs, hotels, restaurants — to add the new dishes to their menus. Those are subtly different audiences with different priorities, which shaped how we approached each shot.
How we approach ready meal photography
Banner Foods provide us with the frozen, pre-packed meals, which means we can prepare and photograph the actual product rather than a specially prepared studio version. Each dish comes with a serving suggestion, and we source the specific ingredients to recreate that suggestion ourselves — our studio in Bromsgrove has a full kitchen for exactly this reason.
Julie handles the food preparation; Darren handles the lighting and photography. (Darren is, by his own admission, considerably better at eating food than preparing it — but fortunately very good at photographing it.)
The balance we’re always working towards in food photography is between appetising and authentic. Food that looks too perfect stops looking real. Food that looks too casual doesn’t look appetising. The goal is to make each dish look exactly like what it is — genuinely good food, photographed at its best.
The outcome
We’ll let Chris Banner explain what the photography delivered in practice:
“For the first time in a few years I decided to use a professional photographer to capture images of my new products — main course entrées for pubs and restaurants that we sell through a network of distributors nationwide. The images Darren and Julie produced were fantastic, and I managed to get more listings this year than in any previous year. Listings mean sales, and I expect a good year ahead. I have no doubt that having a good set of images while presenting my products has helped me sell to distributors. Darren and Julie were easy to communicate with and delivered a highly professional end result. I will be using them again in the near future.”
Chris Banner, Banner Foods
That’s the commercial case for professional food photography made about as clearly as it can be. Better images, more listings, more sales.
If you’re a food producer, food service business or hospitality brand looking for photography that actually moves product, get in touch. We’d love to work on your brief.
To see our full range of food photography work or discuss a project, visit our service page.
Related reading: Thinking a Season Ahead: How to Plan Your Food Photography Calendar.
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