Our Little Chef chain of restaurants all started with Sam Alper, a Londoner who popularised caravanning in the UK after the Second World War. In the mid-1950s Alper visited America to market his company's best-selling Sprite caravan alongside catering boss Peter Merchant who was seeking new ideas for his business. It was the era when Americans first took to the roads en masse and what most intrigued both Sam and Peter, were the diner caravans that they saw popping up at the side of some of America's most popular highways.

In 1958 we saw many historic events happen in Britain, including the first section of Motorway opening, the first Trans-Atlantic passenger jet service and the first Little Chef opening its doors to the public. Upon their return to England, Sam and Peter opened an 11-seat diner caravan in Reading, strategically located at what might be described as "the gateway to the West Country". He called it "Little Chef" after the American diner that had first inspired him and hey presto, Little Chef brand was born!

In the 1980s our growth continued as we added overnight stopovers to our food service. Little Chef Lodges were opened across the country until Forte acquired the Travelodge chain in 1990 and our Little Chef's rooms were all rebranded under the Travelodge umbrella.

In 1995 we opened a fast-food takeaway operation called "Little Chef Express" which enabled us to open inside shopping centres and airport terminals. In 1996 we were taken over by Granada, who then closed the Little Chef coffee stops, changing most to Burger King outlets.

In 1994 the iconic Olympic Breakfast was added to our menu, which remains a best-seller to this day.

In 2007 ownership changed hands to our current owners RCapital. To celebrate we decided to team up with Heston Blumenthal, who tweaked the menu and helped develop a new look for Little Chef. For the first time in restaurant chain history, Little Chef made it into the Good Food Guide in 2010 and 2011, and we began opening our new 'concept' restaurants, known as "Wonderfully British".

In early 2012 we restructured to focus on our 80 profitable restaurants and launched a summer of big changes. We're a proud British company, and where possible we source locally produced ingredients for our restaurants. Our new menu made a marked return to what we do best, simple and freshly cooked to order British food. Our takeaway concept was revitalised with the re-launch of Little Chef Express and we added quality freshly-ground Italian coffee to the menu thanks to our new partnership with Lavazza.

To top off a fantastic year we were chosen to appear in a book about The Queen's favourite British brands, in honour of Her Majesty's Diamond Jubilee. cementing in history the love of Little Chef brand.

To kick-start 2013 our focus turned to Charlie, with our famous mascot finally finding his voice and jumping online. Having been in the background for almost 55 years this much loved chef is back and has taken to Twitter in a bid to get 'Britain breakfasting Little Chef style'.

We have a fantastic year ahead of us, make sure you keep checking back to find out what's next for Charlie and Little Chef!