The aim of this new grant is to enable clubs and other eligible organisations to both generate income and operate their facilities more sustainably through use of The Huddle Catering Units. A key priority for us is to ensure that the surplus income generated through sale of food and beverages is used to improve the grass pitch quality on site. Installing a Catering Unit can also lead to a better experience for players, spectators and all engaging with community sports.

The programme is being funded by the Football Foundation – the charity of The Premier League, The FA and Government.

This would need to be on a case-by-case basis – however we could not support a catering unit for a stadia pitch site.

All Catering Units will have a 10-year (minimum) parts and labour warranty for the unit (structural integrity and waterproofing). 

The applicant is responsible for ensuring that the appropriate planning decision has been made in relation to the project. However, in most cases the suppliers will lead & support on the planning process with the applicant – planning fees can be included as part of the project costs.  

The CFA pipeline will allow us to see the overall interest in the programme and the central database will then allow us to see how this “interest” translates into applications. The Football Foundation’s central database will allow us to monitor the progress of applications.  

Projects can access the application form at any time, like they can for an application for storage or goalposts. However, we are asking applicants to firstly speak to their County FAs before applying, so that they’re made aware of the project so that they can check eligibility & then support the project.  

We are then asking CFAs to liaise with their Delivery Managers to ensure that the project is eligible & suitable – this is to help us build the pipeline and to ensure that projects contacting the suppliers are coming forward with suitable projects.  

Once applicants have confirmation from the CFA & Delivery Managers that the project is suitable, they can contact suppliers. Supplier landing pages will ask for confirmation that clubs have spoken to their CFAs first.  

No, we are happy for County FAs to liaise with applicants to confirm they are happy for the project to reach out to suppliers.  

This will vary depending on the design & supplier’s guidance. The average life of a modular building is 20 to 30 years. The average life of converted shipping container can be up to 50 years. 

It is a condition of the fund that for grass pitch sites all revenues generated by the funded facility, net of operational expenditure, are ring-fenced into a grass pitch maintenance budget held by the applicant. The purpose of this fund will be to re-invest to ensure that the grass pitches are maintained to meet the Grounds Management Association Frame ‘Good’ or ‘Advanced’ standard (or any superseding standard) for the duration of the clawback period. The applicant will be asked to provide pitch quality data a minimum of once per year during the playing season using PitchPower, the Football Foundation’s nominated Digital Assessment Tool. The Football Foundation also reserves the right to request evidence of how any surpluses have been reinvested. The project can also apply for Grass Pitch Maintenance Fund to improve their grass pitches.  

There are no priorities in terms of the type of site.