I have just come back from Farm & More Conference, where there were record numbers of delegates and a thriving trade show alongside it. There was a general feeling of buoyancy about last year, despite the recession, which would have been even more optimistic had many of the retail outlets not been hit hard by the snow at the start of January. There were stories of new farm shops that had reached over £1million turnover in their first year and several more established shops now trading at £3-4million.

I think it is true to say that this sector is no longer an interesting sideline to the high street, but an important part of food retail in the UK. Just as well really as our business is built on it – and I have just put into place growth plans of 60% over the next two financial years!

It also became clear to me through talking to delegates and generally observing what is working, and what isn’t, in farm shops throughout the UK. Clearly to be a genuine farm shop there should be some of the farm’s produce for sale within the shop whether that be animal or vegetable. There should also be other locally sourced products, possibly from other farms in the area or artisan local producers.

However, let me sound a warning bell here. Many of those shops that limit themselves exclusively to local produce are not growing and developing as they might. That may be fine if the shop is a lifestyle business, but to get into the multi-million £ turnover levels, it is important to also stock those products that consumers expect to find in a speciality food shop. Stocking these extras, which may in some cases be 50% of the stock of the shop, enables the retailers to increase the basket spend per customer. I was shocked at how low these average baskets were – generally ranging from £12-£20 from those who spoke up in the seminar. Increasing the range of products in the store should surely manage to add 50% to these baskets and markedly increase profitability. Another clear strategy for a “winning farm shop” is to have some products made in store e.g. a bakery. This dramatically increases the “realness” of the shop and psychologically encourages customers to spend more. One farm shop gave the example of meat pies. They used to buy these in locally but when they invested in some equipment and started making their own, sales increased by more than three-fold.

No rest for the wicked. By the time you read this I shall be in Cologne at ISM (European confectionery and bakery show) shopping for next Christmas. Well, we have had the luxury of not thinking about Christmas for a month – and that’s it!!

24-30 January 2010 celebrates the eleventh annual Farmhouse Breakfast Week. The awareness week is organised by the HGCA and acts as an opportunity to educate the nation into the importance of eating a healthy breakfast.

Cotswold Fayre, the fine food supplier, stocks a range of breakfast products and is supporting the HCGA campaign. Here are some of Britain’s must have breakfast foods that can be bought directly from the website.

Porridge

Porridge’s growth in popularity has changed the face of British breakfast habits. This low fat, oaty breakfast cereal, which releases energy slowly, keeps you feeling fuller for longer and stops the hunger pangs till lunchtime. The high soluble fibre content of oats is also beneficial as diets low in fat and rich in soluble fibre have been shown to help reduce high blood cholesterol levels. Oats also provide useful amounts of thiamin, riboflavin and vitamin B6 plus calcium, magnesium, iron and zinc and small amounts of vitamin E and folic acid  – making porridge a super nutrient-dense food, full of natural goodness.  In addition, long gone are the days where you had to stand over a hot stove stirring a pot of porridge.  Most rolled porridge oats are pre-steamed, which means that they can be cooked in minutes on the hob or in the microwave.

Bread or Toast

Nothing beats the tempting smell of hot toast.  It’s synonymous with breakfast and nearly one in six people say it’s their favourite breakfast smell (according to an online survey conducted by OnePoll).
Bread is an important source of energy and other nutrients.  For the health conscious, wholemeal toast is best – it is a good source of dietary fibre, protein, B vitamins and one slice makes up one of your recommended three daily servings of wholegrain. Why not make your own bread at home? Not only will it smell great but you can tailor the ingredients to create your perfect loaf!

Wholegrain cereals

Breakfast cereals account for over half (53.6%) of breakfasts eaten at home (TNS Worldpanel 2008). The choice is astounding, so look out for the many wholegrain cereals made from wheat, oats and barley.  Several studies have shown that those who eat lots of wholegrains, such as wholegrain cereals or bread, reduce the risk of heart disease by up to 30%. Breakfast can be a rushed affair for many - 40% of people spend less than 10 minutes preparing and eating their breakfast during the week (Breakfast Facts from www.farmhousebreakfast.com) so wholegrain cereals provide the perfect solution.  A bowl of wholegrain cereal served with semi-skimmed milk only takes minutes to eat.
Cotswold Fayre stocks a wide range of cereals including tasty porridge as well as different varieties of bread flour, check out the fantastic range of breakfast products here: http://www.cotswold-fayre.co.uk

About Cotswold Fayre

Further information about Cotswold Fayre can be obtained from the website, the most comprehensive trade website for speciality food in the UK, and from Paul Hargreaves blog, Speciality Bites.  The product range is also available to the public via orders from the sister company Real Food Direct.

For further information on Cotswold Fayre, its products and services please contact MD Paul Hargreaves of Cotswold Fayre Ltd, Units 9-11, Manor Farm, Peppard Common, Henley-on-Thames, RG9 5LA.

Tel: +44 (0)8456 121201    Email: paul@cotswold-fayre.co.uk

Editors Notes:

•    Farmhouse Breakfast Week is organised by HGCA
•    *HGCA aims to improve the production and marketing of cereals. It provides market information, assists cereal product development, promotes exports and funds research and development. It is a division of the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB).
•    For more information about Farmhouse Breakfast week 2010 visit http://www.farmhousebreakfast.com

As a fine food distributor we are dedicated to maintaining the highest service levels. Because the problem is not getting any better, we have now created a new position of “Supply Chain Manager” – mainly to ensure our suppliers give us as good service as we are aiming to give our customers.  If independent retailers are to maintain the growth they have experienced over the last few years we must get more professional and slicker in our supply chains.

I would be interested to hear from retailers how much weeks like this affect your business. As a wholesaler I know we lost around 30-35% of turnover this week compared to what we would have done weather permitting. Clearly retailers also lose out, in some cases because they have to close, but do consumers come out and spend a bit more when they get out and about again as presumably they have a bit more in their pockets after being stuck at home for a few days? Let me know.

I would also be interested to hear how Christmas was for speciality food retailers this week. Our sales in the last quarter of 2009 were 20% up on the previous year’s figures, but, of course, we only know what has gone into the shops, not what goes through the tills. Generally though, through the places I have been since Christmas, there doesn’t seem to be masses of Christmas products on the 50% sales. Is this your experience?

The final few days before Christmas, again massively affected by the weather for us, were incredibly busy. Again we lost a whole day’s deliveries and had to send out 28 pallets one day just to clear some of the backlog. Customers were still ordering Christmas goods right up to 22nd December, which suggests to me considerably more optimism than 2008, when we had quite a lot of Christmas lines left in the warehouse at Christmas. This year there was virtually nothing! Great news for us!

Finally, an HR question! To pay or not to pay staff who don’t make it in on “snow days”. I take the view that we don’t pay those who don’t come in to work when it snows. To pay people anyway not only disincentivises staff to make the effort, but is a bit of a slap in the face for those who have braved hell and high water to get into work, albeit late. We give staff the opportunity to make up the time by working more hours when the weather is back to normal. Am I a harsh old sod or is this becoming general practice? I think the last couple of working weeks will move others to my position!

We heard last week that Rumwell Farm Shop, Taunton is the first shop in the UK to receive The Genuine Own And Local (GOAL) certificate from the Farmers’ Retail & Markets Association (FARMA).

The accreditation is awarded to shops selling their own farm produce, and was introduced to help consumers identify ‘real’ farm shops. Clearly this is a very worthwhile cause and certainly not an “own-goal” by FARMA. There are several imposter “farm shops” that have sprung up within the last year or so, even since it was announced that farm retail was the fastest growing retail sector in the UK at 17%. So there is most definitely a need to recognise the genuine farm shops based on a farm and selling their own produce, whether that be meat, fruit and veg or herbs.

However, is this scheme really worth spending money on? I would have thought that the average farm shop customer would have enough intelligence to recognise what is a genuine farm shop and what is not. Noticing tractors and animals when driving up to the farm shop are normally a bit of a giveaway, as are signs pointing to pick-your-own fields. Conversely a garden centre surrounded by roses, fushias and other herbaceous things for sale having a “farm shop” just before the checkout might be a clue that the products sold there aren’t grown or reared in the garden centre! Maybe we should credit our customers with a bit more intelligence. Those consumers without the intelligence to recognise a genuine farm shop are probably at home lying on the sofa, drinking Stella, eating their ready meal watching Eastenders, so probably don’t darken our doors anyway!

I understand FARMA wanting to protect its member’s interests and their motives are highly commendable. However, we ought not to be too harsh on those independent food halls that are springing up all over the UK. Okay, some of them are calling themselves farm shops, and this is probably ill-advised. Let’s say to them, call yourself a food hall, but as a supporter of farm shops, I would not want to discourage places like this from opening up. After all they are probably selling genuine produce from local farms (even though it might not be their own) and other gourmet food products that are of far higher quality than the products at the local supermarket. I, for one, would never want to knock an independent food shop that by its very nature would be educating consumers in their food choice simply by existing.

I am writing this a week before Christmas Eve – so the busiest week of the year for fine food retailers. You may be so busy that you might not have time to read this, but Happy and Prosperous Christmas to you anyway!

Anyway enough of that, I am back now. I have had the opportunity twice within the last two weeks to see just how low helping food businesses is on the government priority list. We all know ‘Food from Britain’ had its problems and wasted quite a lot of government money, but the UK desperately needs some kind of cohesive plan to encourage and help the UK’s food businesses export their products to Europe and beyond. There has never been a better time to export Britain’s food due to the low £ and the increased profile of British food throughout the world, but we simply are not able to make enough of this opportunity. At a food show I attended in Shanghai, there were big stands from Australia, New Zealand, France, Italy and many other places. The British stand totaled three companies – an embarrassing effort. I know the government has other issues on its plate at present, but one of the best ways of increasing the strength of our economy is through the balance of payments - please impress this upon your MP and lobby for funding for the food businesses of the UK.

The second type of lack of funding I have seen at first hand is in my new role as a director of the South-East Food Group Partnership. This is the umbrella organisation for the Southern counties regional food groups such as Hampshire Fare, Taste of Sussex etc… The funding is cut for 2010/11 financial year – most of these county organisations will survive this (except one), but for the following year there is a real danger that some more of these groups will disappear. For a new gourmet food producer just starting up, these organisations are a tremendous help and can help enormously in raising the profile of small food businesses. They also enable small producers to exhibit at trade shows without it costing a fortune. Clearly it will be detrimental to the food culture of the UK if the funding to these organisations is cut further.

Well, that is all for this week. Sorry to be a little depressing this week. Sorry about that, but do enjoy the next two and a half weeks. It looks like a very busy Christmas trading period for us all.

However, my blog this week is on the more general lessons we can learn from China, which is essentially a nation of entrepreneurs. Despite some of their business practices being either illegal or bordering on it, there are many within that growing economy that challenge our western small-mindedness:

• The Chinese are very open to taking risks. I think, possibly due to their history of traumatic cataclysmic events, the attitude is very much that “we have nothing to lose”, so let’s go for it. They back themselves to succeed and very often they do. If not they will pick themselves up and start again with no time for self-pity.

• They are great sales people. Anyone with any time to spare will get out on the streets and sell a “copy watch”. The guy who shouted “idiot” after I refused him perhaps hasn’t been to the latest sales training course, but he was certainly keen to do business!

• They are a nation of hard-workers. Most businesses seem to function six or seven days a week and the business owners put in a tremendous amount of hours – perhaps this is one that is not completely alien to many of us.

• Customer service and hospitality are high on the agenda. Yet again when travelling out of the west, I was struck at how customers are made to feel special in many places – and this isn’t in the hope of getting a tip. Tipping is not part of Chinese culture. Two examples of this. Firstly, the first hotel I stayed at in Hong Kong gave me two presents just for checking in! Secondly, in a restaurant in Shanghai when going to the loo, there was a guy who ran the water in the basin, squeezed the soap onto my hand and got the towels from the dispenser. (Fortunately he didn’t attempt to help me any earlier in the process!)

• Finally, they are very quick to see a new opportunity. They seem to be able to get on with a new venture incredibly quickly and grasp a new opportunity much quicker than most of us would. This is largely due to their short-term view of the future - a business plan of longer than six months would be slightly unusual for a start-up.

I have come back full of energy and inspired to go for expansion in my own business and start to take more calculated risks in 2010. Let us all open our eyes for opportunities in the run-up to Christmas and beyond.

Have a good week.

When going into a supermarket to shop we almost inevitably come out with many more items than we intended to buy.  That’s how the big retail chains do it.  It’s nothing new; the trade term is a “loss leader” a more realistic and down to earth description would be “a sprat to catch a mackerel”.

So why don’t we mackerels take another look at the independent food shops, we might even save some money.   The range of shops in the independent sector is breathtaking, great delicatessens, wine stores, retailers that sell the best coffee and tea around and of course genuine health food stores.  Interestingly the market share of the independent sector is rising.  So there might be some logic in following this new trend by starting to visit your local deli.  Fruit and vegetables will be cheaper in many independent stores and fresh meat will be what it says it is.  It’s doubtful if the ham and chicken will be bulked up with water to increase weight and volume either.

Why are organic foods being dropped by the supermarkets?  Is it because the organic producers won’t be bullied into loss making deals?  One could be forgiven for thinking that corporate retailers are dumbing down the choices to appear to always be cheaper.  Cheap food should be cheap it hasn’t got anything else going for it.

Cotswold Fayre is a deli wholesaler that supplies excellent organic and gourmet food to local delis, including savoury snacks, chutneys and pickles. These independent shops won’t sell one item below cost and then inflate 10 others to make up the loss.  But they will offer a fantastic range of food and beverage products supplied by Cotswold Fayre,  one of the best delicatessen suppliers in the UK. Visit the website to browse a whole range of products sourced from all over the UK and Europe.

Customer Loyalty
For regular customers Cotswold Fayre is also running a customer loyalty scheme where customers will have the opportunity to win days out and even holidays.

About Cotswold Fayre
Further information about Cotswold Fayre can be obtained from the website, the most comprehensive trade website for speciality food in the UK, and from Paul Hargreaves’ blog, Speciality Bites.  The product range is also available to the public via orders from the sister company Real Food Direct.

For further information on Cotswold Fayre, its products and services please contact MD Paul Hargreaves of Cotswold Fayre Ltd, Units 9-11, Manor Farm, Peppard Common, Henley-on-Thames, RG9 5LA.

Tel: +44 (0)8456 121201    Email: paul@cotswold-fayre.co.uk

However, despite all that, the independent food shops seemed to be thriving.  Sure they have had to adapt some of their ranges and offerings, but only one of the retailers (and that was a small supermarket chain) I visited seemed very concerned about the current economy.  In fact in Dublin, per capita, there were more independent food halls than cities in the UK.  Donnybrook Fair, Fallon & Byrne and Fresh who between them I think have eight outlets were full of customers spending money.  In fact Fallon & Byrne is worth singling out for a special mention.  On three floors it has a wine bar in the cellar, a thriving food hall on the ground and a splendid restaurant with great wine on the first floor. You won’t be surprised to learn that I spent about four hours there – I’ll leave you to guess on which floor!

Bearing in mind my comments a few weeks ago about food halls in London, you might find it surprising that there is room for so many quality outlets in Dublin.  However, perhaps not.  Dublin is still a relatively wealthy city with earnings 15-20% higher than the UK. But more importantly than that perhaps is the culture of supporting independent retailers on that side of the Irish Sea.  Whilst some community has broken down over the last few years, it is noticeably higher than in the UK.  That will be obvious to anyone who has been over there outside Dublin.  When that comes to shopping, consumers are more used to walking to their local butcher, greengrocer or corner shop than UK citizens.  The Irish, I believe, are less likely to jump in the car and drive to their nearest out-of-town hypermarket than those in the UK.

Whilst it might be a grand idea to believe that independent food shops can change a culture, small things can make a difference.  If you have the space, inviting a mums and toddlers group to use your café one morning a week, having a pensioners discount day, opening a wine bar alongside your retail outlet (!) can all create a sense of community. Supermarkets can never do this, despite the marketing!

It is a myth amongst consumers that supermarkets are cheap for all products and certainly far cheaper than any independent.  This simply is often not the case for fresh produce, meat, fish, fruit and vegetables.  And I believe we need to work harder to expose the lie that supermarkets are always cheaper.  Yes they are for certain products and gourmet food suppliers will never get near them on price in some of these cases, but there we have an opportunity to emphasize our quality.  I had the misfortune to buy some steak at a local supermarket the other day (whilst I was out price-checking some products) and despite being marketed as premium, it was absolutely terrible, and probably no more expensive than a better product at my local farm shop.

Loss leaders.  This is something the supermarkets regularly do to get punters into the shop and spending money, but most independent shops don’t consider this as a marketing strategy.  We don’t need to sell at a loss, but sell at cost and if it is a popular product, new customers will come in and make your margin elsewhere, whether that be more shopping or in the coffee shop.  Let me know the products where you have tried this and it works.

Finally a story from my local Waitrose this week.  Again I was out price-checking certain goods, and had bought a few token items.  Standing in the basket check-out, the lady in front of me (aged 36) was buying a bottle of wine and was asked for proof of age – a very unnecessary question in view of her age!  She didn’t have any, and as a result couldn’t buy the bottle of wine despite her protestations.  As a favour, I whispered to her that I would buy the wine and give it to her outside.  I grabbed the wine off the counter, was told by Waitrose staff that I couldn’t buy it.  I said actually I can as I am a paying customer.  I walked past the 36-year-old, saying that I would sort out the wine and money outside, went outside and waited – and nothing happened.  After five minutes I gave up and went home with a bottle of wine I didn’t want!  So much for being a good Samaritan!