For $7 parents can go online and choose a main item, a piece of baking, one snack and a seasonal fruit which will be delivered to their child's school.

The idea won the students second place at the iDEAStarter competition and put them in the running for the Young Enterprise Scheme competition.

Food Dudes chief executive Cameron Hooper said he came up with the idea after watching his parents struggle to provide healthy lunches while working fulltime jobs.

"It started with my mother, she wanted an easy solution to give myself and my two brothers lunch."

The start-up had road bumps along the way, the group had to source ingredients at a low cost so their meals would be affordable while also creating a profit.

"Because we're not a big enough company for us to wholesale, we don't order that stuff in large enough quantities," said Cameron.

"So it was really us getting off our backsides and going and talking to people, so we managed to get a lot of our stuff for free from local people who supported us."

To comply with health and safety regulations the food is prepared in a commercial kitchen with trained chefs advising the group about proper food handling techniques.

To cut costs even further the group used social media for advertising and found a cheaper alternative for processing online transactions.

Right now the business is delivering meals to Bombay School, Pukekohe Hill School, Puni School and Ramarama School but the group believe they could expand if the demand increased.

To order a lunch from for your child visit https://the-food-dudes-nz.mystorbie.com

Fifty cents from every order is donated to the customer child's primary school.