Keep 'em peeled
At the moment, that means Acock is literally going bananas. "We want to get into bananas and from discussions with Fyffes there's product available. We have done kitchen trials."
Fourayes, which is based in Sittingbourne, Kent, has created a new banana and toffee or banoffee donut filling and banoffee purée for smoothies. Acock believes they have potential for the whole of Europe, not just the UK, so he's taking the idea to the Food Ingredients Europe (FIE) show in Paris at the end of November. "We think the European market is ready for banoffee," he says. "They keep asking us for distinctly British products, so we're making some to promote at FIE. We'll keep Food Manufacture posted on how we get on."
The innovation doesn't stop there. He's working with Nelson's brewery in Chatham, Kent, on a Bramley apple beer.
On the subject of Bramleys, Fourayes' traditional stock-in-trade, Acock is convinced that it's time for them, too, to crack the entire European market. The business processes 11,000t a year, 1,500t of which it grows itself. So far, they have not been used extensively for processing outside the UK. "I hope Bramleys will be well received. They are highly acidic, well-suited to desserts to balance the flavour profile."
These are just some of the examples of Acock's constant quest to broaden his firm's portfolio, show its flexibility in responding to customer needs and turn every situation to its advantage.
Another example would be its swift response to a glut of imported plums this summer, driven by booming European harvests. Supermarkets initially opted to stock them in preference to UK fruit because they were cheaper, leaving large amounts of UK produce in danger of going to waste. Fortunately, Fourayes leapt to the aid of local farmers, snapping up some of the surplus and turning it into jam.
Acock believes there would be far less waste in the food chain if customers and suppliers communicated more closely and quickly over supply and demand. Improving efficiency and minimising waste are big motivations for him.
He's overseeing the construction of a bore hole on Fourayes' land that will help make the firm less dependent on mains water, for instance. "We can extract water from it and purify it for use in the plant. We hope to halve our water bill, saving about £10,000 a year." He's even looking into an inquiry from a university, which is investigating extracting nutrients from apple pips, cores and skins.
Of course, all this innovation, whether for waste reduction or new products, demands a certain level of investment. Fourayes' plum jamboree was only made possible by the firm's diversification into jam making for finished products and fillings, having invested in vacuum production for that 18 months ago. "We're working on Kentish strawberry, hibiscus, rose, orange and elderflower jam; we're able to offer jams with provenance, with 65% fruit," says Acock.
The company upgraded computer control of on site and off site fruit storage environments almost two years ago. The new system emails the site manager automatically if there's a problem, for example, with the temperature. And it invested £300,000 in installing and operating a new aseptic plant for fruit purées, which went live in March.
All this goes towards the firm's target to grow sales from £11M now to £20M by 2016, which is why Acock's always stretching the company's capabilities.
