Responsive & Responsible School Food Service Management

Since 1993, Fresh Picks Café has pioneered the art and science of responsible, responsive food service management and quality dining programs that K-12 school communities are proud to call their own. Our collaborative approach to school dining respects and adapts to your community’s specific goals, demographics, personality and budget.

In 2024, Fresh Picks Café was acquired by Whitsons Culinary Group. Whitsons and Fresh Picks share in the belief wellness and good food go hand in hand, especially in education, and were both founded on the principles of dedication and personalized service. Read more

Fresh Picks Cafe remains focused on the goals and nuances of each community we serve has proven to benefit school districts across New England. We are typically engaged to help schools with seamless transition from self-operated programs, or when a national vendor’s generic “cookie cutter” program lacks local connection, participation and promise.

Your community gains access to a dedicated local staff of chefs, RDNs, compliance officers, safety coordinators and procurement specialists that passionately support your school community – enabling the school to focus on its core mission of educating students.

Responsive to Your Needs

Born and bred in Northeast, our management team is unrivaled for accessibility and prides itself on building strong, personal relationships with our clients as well as on responding quickly and competently to any concerns that may arise.  We listen to the needs of each community we serve and respond quickly.

Responsible to Your Community 

Fresh Picks Café lives by the concept that people are our most valuable asset. Our employees, the students and adults we serve, and the community members of our school districts are all valuable parts of your food service program. With our strong dedication to people, creating a safe environment becomes almost a personal mantra for Fresh Picks Café. If we are truly going to live up to our stated philosophy of valuing people, keeping those people safe must be the foundation of all our business activity. 

Fresh Picks Café’s dedication to being responsible to your community is evident in our standard programs. In our robust safety training program (required for all employees) and high standards for food safety. In our green initiatives and active Farm to School programs. In our detailed program reporting to school administrators and industry leading package of insurance protections for our clients. 

Responsible to Your Budget

Public school funding is consistently a hotly debated topic. As stewards of taxpayer money, school district administrators consistently face pressures to do more with less. A school food service program that isn’t managed properly can quickly become a drain on financial resources. Classrooms shouldn’t have to compete with the food service program for valuable resources.

The food service management professionals of Fresh Picks Café have dedicated their careers to understanding how to deliver the right quality and value for the right price. By partnering with an organization whose sole focus is providing great, healthy meals to students in a school setting our clients find their programs to be more efficient, more competently run and with more fiscal responsibility than when they tried to do it on their own.