Horwich Mead Company toasts success
21 Feb 2020 10:52
Published by:
Daniel Almond
A WINNING collaboration between Bolton-based creative design and marketing agency, Portfolio, and The Lancashire Mead Company, has led to 50 percent growth for the Horwich-based meadery in the last year.
Established in 2013 and run by husband and wife team, Gordon Baron and Ann Farrell, The Lancashire Mead Company approached the agency for help in January 2019 when their website crashed. Within 10 days, Portfolio had built them a new website and developed a new logo and a consistent look across the site and promotional material.
In 2017 they were making 200 litres per batch, now capacity has increased to 1400 litres per batch. Capable of producing up to 500 bottles per day, the meadery has also joined forces with C&O Wines in Altrincham, specialist wine suppliers to the hospitality industry, who are handling distribution across the north of England.
Darren Clare, Creative Director at Portfolio, said: "My first question to Gordon and Ann was "Can you make more mead?" because I could see the huge growth potential of the brand. Each bottle is named after a Norse god, so the design draws inspiration from medieval influences. The fact that we were able to turn the project around so rapidly meant that they lost minimal sales when the original website went down. The huge increase in sales this last year is pleasing and testament to our can do attitude and creative flair."
The meadery has also received award recognition in the last twelve months, winning the Gold medal in the ‘Traditional mead: Dry' category at the 2019 European Mead Makers Association Conference in Poland for its ‘Baldur's Mead' which beat stiff competition from brewers across Eastern Europe, Korea, Japan and New Zealand. ‘Aegir's Mead' also picked up the Silver medal in the 'Melomels and other Fruits' category.
Gordon Baron of The Lancashire Mead Company, said: "Portfolio came to our rescue when the website went down and we knew we'd have to get everything back up and running in time for our most profitable event, the Jorvik Viking Festival in February. We're delighted with the results and they're a great team to work with. Because of the success we're looking to automate the bottling line and have recently invested in new filtration equipment."
Now one of the largest producers of real mead in the UK, the firm's mead is supplied at iconic London restaurant Claridge's and at L'Enclume in Cartmel, which is run by Michelin starred chef Simon Rogan. Through the partnership with C&O Wines, the mead is also now available at restaurants owned by former Masterchef winner, Simon Wood.
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