Taking a bite out of the snack market
Come September, Cork-based company Veronica’s Snacks is aiming to fill children’s lunchboxes with dinosaurs.
Targeting the lunchbox market with a range of baked, gluten-free corn snacks, the company has recently released Tyrano, a dino-shaped cheese flavoured T-Rex character.
Company founder and director Veronica Kenneally expects Crunchy Creatures to appeal to kids because they are fun and to parents because they are healthier.
“Parents are concerned about the amount of saturated fat that can be found in children’s lunchboxes. Our organic Crunchy Creatures range will help fill a gap in the market for snacks that are lower in fat, have no trans fats and have fewer calories than other snacks,” says Ms Kenneally.
The release of Crunchy Creatures characters, Bronto and Stego in 2015 will increase the Veronica’s Snacks range to six. Already selling gluten-free crisps to 300 stores in Ireland and to Tesco and Harvey Nichols in the UK, the company is now aiming to take a bigger bite of the export market.
“The UK is the second biggest consumer of snacks in the world after the US. The market there is worth billions of pounds, so it offers us a lot of potential,” says Ms Kenneally, who has also spoken to retailers in France and Germany.
A food business graduate who worked for 10 years in the dairy industry, Ms Kenneally came up with the idea of creating healthier snacks when she watched her own daughter eat crisps on the beach three years ago.
“I did some research and discovered that €170m was being spent on snack foods in Ireland with 70% of this going on crisps. I looked at the UK market and found that the market there was huge.”
The healthier option she came up with was to use a waffle-making method to create a baked snack.
“It was difficult to find a manufacturer for this since all the crisp makers in Ireland dip their crisps in oil. But I found a company in Slovakia, only one of two in the world which was doing this,” she says.
Once she had a manufacturer she needed flavours. The test was in making gluten-free snacks with less oil than regular crisps but making them tasty. “I tried and tested a lot of flavours on our own children and found two they liked — BBQ and sour cream,” she recalls.
After that, she got packaging designed, and in November 2012 took her first delivery of a container with 1,400 boxes, each containing 24 packs.
Working with two healthfood distributors, Ms Kenneally began selling Veronica’s baked crisps to health food shops around the country. Members of a local coeliac’s group told her they wanted to see her products in supermarkets, so she thought she would give it a try.
“I called to SuperValu in Ballincollig, which immediately took 24 boxes and after that I went to SuperValus around Munster.”
She spoke to buyers in Dunnes Stores, BWG Foods (Spar, Mace and Eurospar) and, in 2013, got a call from a Tesco buyer who had tried a packet of her snacks in a pub.
“Now we sell in 79 SuperValu stores, 55 Tesco outlets and 35 Dunnes Stores and we are nationwide with BWG Foods and are in healthfood shops around the country,” says Ms Kenneally, who has been joined in the business by her husband Brian Dennis.
She received early support from Cork City Enterprise Board, which provided her with a mentor. Last year she enrolled in Enterprise Start at the Rubicon Centre and received funding from Enterprise Ireland to attend the 2013 International Food Exhibition in the UK.
“We were placed in the top 10 exhibitors at the exhibition and this helped sign up our first customers in the UK. Now we sell to Harvey Nichols, Planet Organic and Amazon and have recently signed a deal with DDC, Tree of Life and Suma Wholesalers. This year, we have gone in to 155 Tesco stores in the UK and are in negotiations with another UK multiple,” says Ms Kenneally.
Sales have grown by over 300% in the last year and the company is planning to bring production to Ireland. Recognised as a High Potential Start-Up by Enterprise Ireland, Veronica’s Snacks now aims to raise €500,000 to develop exports and release more dinosaurs.
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