A food wholesaler with a depot in Carmarthen says Christmas has come early: pre-orders for the festive season are running around 1,100% ahead of last year, two weeks after its Christmas brochure went out. Harlech Foodservice, family-run and on course for record sales of £75m, says it is expecting its busiest Christmas yet.
The figure is the company’s own, and it comes with a sweetener. Customers who pre-order £250 of Christmas stock get a free bottle of Prosecco, which commercial manager Chris Gregson says has been “a huge hit”.
A Baby Guinness from Port Eynon
Among the 420 products in the brochure, 78 of them new, is a coffee liqueur from the Gower Gin Company at Port Eynon, made with Gower Coffee and aimed at the two drinks the trade cannot pour fast enough.
“This year espresso martini is the most popular cocktail in the UK and Baby Guinness shots are the top shots in the UK, so we have made our own coffee liqueur this year,” said Siân Brooks, who founded the company with her husband Andrew nine years ago. “You pour the coffee liqueur and either float Baileys on the top or double cream, so it looks like a little Guinness.”
It is the four-person firm’s first Christmas with Harlech. Its gin is made with laver seaweed Andrew gathers on Gower, there is a seaweed botanical vodka too, and the company, Small Drinks Producer of the Year at the 2024 Wales Food and Drink Awards, took its range to Spitalfields Market in London for St David’s Day this year.
“The enthusiasm from the buyers we have met here was brilliant,” Siân said. “Sometimes that is what you need, about eight minutes is a good enough time to do it.”
Andrew added: “It is really important to be able to meet the people who will be selling your products and to get your story across, that is critical.”
Eight minutes to sell a mince pie
The eight minutes is the point. Harlech launched the brochure to its own staff at what it called a Christmas Roadshow at the Ramada Plaza in Wrexham, where 40 employees in Christmas jumpers, Santa hats and reindeer costumes sat down with 28 producers for speed-dating sessions: eight minutes to taste the product and hear the pitch, then move on.
“It’s quite simple really, how can you sell something if you haven’t tried it yourself, or you don’t know what it is, or how you cook it?” Chris said.
Managing director Mark Lawton said: “When you are sitting down with a customer you need to explain what the product is, you need to explain how it fits their menu, the portion sizes, the margins they can make selling that product.” Christmas, he said, “is huge for the food and drink sector and a key trading time for us”.
From a £6,000 loan to £75m
The brochure goes out to restaurants, pubs, schools and hospitals across Wales, the North West of England, Shropshire and the Midlands, from bases in Cricieth, Chester, Carmarthen, Aberbargoed and Telford.
The company began in 1972 with a £6,000 loan from Dorothy Edwards, known as Granny Dot, to her daughter and son-in-law to buy a frozen food shop in Harlech. When she died in March at 102 it employed 300 people, turned over around £70m and had been named UK Food Wholesaler of the Year; the £75m it now expects would be its biggest year yet.
“As a family-run company based in Wales we are delighted to continue to support Welsh produce,” Chris said.
Mid Wales pop in elf hats
Radnor Hills, the Knighton soft drinks maker with 250 staff, sent its Heartsease Farm pressé range and two members of staff dressed as elves. National account manager Molly Breakwell said the firm had worked with Harlech for about ten years and that Christmas was “huge” for the brand.
“This event is a great opportunity to showcase how versatile our product is and how it can be used in various different sectors,” she said.
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