After eight successful years of business the Old Bridge Catering Company has grown from being the smallest in the south east to the biggest. “Our speciality would be a whole pig cooked on a spit and finished off with a barbeque. It is not only a meal for an entire wedding reception but it’s a focal point and also a talking point. The people tend to ask you more questions and be a little less tense about the whole food issue.” says Willie Rochford, creator of the Old Bridge Catering Company.
Based in New Ross, Co. Wexford, this small town is now home to the largest and finest catering company in the vicinity. To have grown to such an extent in such a small amount of time is quite an accomplishment. It seems to have instilled a certain amount of pride in Willie too.
“It does make me quite pleased to think that we started off this company from scratch and now we’re the largest company in the South East and people are giving us amazing complements. It does give us a little thrill. People say to us we are the best at what we do – and the customer is always right!” laughs Willie.
“We have a staff that can increase and decrease according to how many are needed for a particular job or function. There can be as few as five or as many as 26. This gives us great flexibility and adds to our appeal, I think because we can cover big parties with the minimum of expense.”
The company mostly deals in catering for wedding receptions in marquees or corporate functions, private parties, clubs and they have a number or contracts with large firms. They can, although, cater for receptions in hotels.
“We have never been asked to but it is entirely possible. If you wanted us to cater for you but not the unreliability associated with a marquee we could cater in a hotel.”
With a selection of over a dozen set menus for you to choose from for your big day the most popular is still the whole spit- roasted pig. But for all the vegetarians out there, there is a whole vegetarian menu and the company is no stranger to doing whole vegetarian weddings.
“Yes, the favourite meal is our spit- roasted pig,” says Willie. “But we’ve done lots of vegetarian weddings. We did one wedding where both the bride and groom were vegetarian and had a full vegetarian reception. It went very well and even though not all the guests were vegetarian they really enjoyed the vegetarian food.”
With four wedding receptions completed already this summer business is flying for Willie. “We’ve done four weddings this summer and more are planned. With our busiest time being the summer we’re usually almost fully booked. Marquee weddings are held in the summer months because of our weather in winter it can be a bit daunting. With this in mind we concentrate on our contract work and other function work from October to March. April to September is our wedding season.”
Another thing that keeps this business well and truly afloat is a certain statistic which Willie quoted: “Every new private customer that tries us out, will use us for other functions at least three to five more times in a three year period. It’s a proven statistic and one we are extremely proud of.”
If Willie’s expectations are anything to go by, the sky is the limit for these versatile, home bred caterers.
