Meet the award-winning Shropshire nut butter makers

Keen to harness their natural super powers, Zoe Harrison began making her own nut butters at home using a range of carefully-sourced ingredients.

And now the award-winning artisan producer supplies farm shops, delis, fine food halls and other independents across the UK as well as selling to customers from her shop at Maws Craft Centre in Jackfield and from her website.

Her aim was to create a product that was different to those she saw on the supermarket shelves, and one that didn’t just contain wholesome ingredients, but also offered environmentally-friendly packaging.

“The ethos from the start has been ethically-sourced ingredients and eco-friendly packaging and I wanted the quality to be as high as it could be,” says Zoe.

“At the time I led a very active lifestyle and I wanted to find all natural products that didn’t have unnecessary ingredients but the nut butters I found had a lot of additives and were in plastic packaging.

“I started making my own for myself, my family and friends and people at the gym and the business grew naturally from there,” she explains.

The mother of two has always been fascinated by nuts and seeds and their many nutritious qualities.

“I think of them as nature’s health capsules, there’s so much goodness all there in one tiny package.

“If you think for a moment about how a nut contains everything needed to develop a huge tree it’s easy to see why they are so good for us.

“Not only are they a great energy source due to the protein and healthy fats they contain, they’re also a rich source of essential vitamins and minerals,” says Zoe.

After perfecting her recipes using nuts and other ingredients such as raw cacao, ginger, cinnamon, she founded Butterbelle while studying for a degree in food, nutrition and wellbeing at Harper Adams University in 2015.

She made the business the basis of her final year project, which enabled her to spend time researching the interests of her potential customers and their attitudes towards packaging. This confirmed her belief that people who ate nut butters as part of a plant-based diet were keen to reduce their environmental impact and didn’t want products packaged in single-use plastic.

Right from the beginning Zoe has shunned non-recyclable containers, opting for reusable glass and bagasse sugar cane fibre labels that are 100 per cent biodegradable.

Butterbelle now has a range of 12 different nut and seed butters,which are completely vegan and palm oil free, with the most in demand varieties being the cacao and orange cashew butter and the gingerbread almond butter.

The range, which also includes a chai spiced almond butter and a pumpkin seed spread, is joined by seasonal specials around the year.

The popularity of nut butters has been spreading in recent years which has gone hand-in-hand with a significant rise in the number of people following a plant-based diet.

“When I first started, nut butters were seen as something that was a bit unusual and I was mostly supplying zero waste shops and speciality shops but we’ve seen an explosion over the past five years and nut butters have become very popular,” explains Zoe.

Butterbelle moved into premises at Maws Craft Centre in Ferry Road, Jackfield, in November 2018 and the team is now looking to expand its space to increase production capacity.

Zoe enjoys trying out new recipes in the kitchen and getting out and about meeting customers.

“I love the days when I’m hands-on with the product, I enjoy the creativity and I’ve met some amazing people who I would never have met otherwise and that has always been a privilege,” says Zoe.

Last year, she returned to Harper Adams as a guest lecturer and an Entrepreneur in Residence. Her time at the university has been spent teaching a range of entrepreneurship and business modules for students taking food technology and business courses.

“I’ve come a full circle having set up my business as a student and now I’m sharing that knowledge and experience with the students,” Zoe tells Weekend.

Earlier this year Butterbelle was awarded the runner-up prize in the Best Rural Food or Drink Business category at the national final of the Rural Business Awards (RBAs), run in partnership with Amazon. Butterbelle reached the final after winning the title of Best Rural Food & Drink Business in the Midlands. More than 70 businesses from across the country were shortlisted in 12 categories at the national event and Zoe says she is delighted to have been chosen as a runner-up.

“This was the first year that we have entered and to make it all the way to the final was absolutely fantastic. It’s a huge boost for both the business and for me and a great platform to reach more Butterbelle customers and fans and spread our nut butter love,” she says.

Like many other companies, Butterbelle hasn’t been immune to the impact of Covid-19. And the pandemic couldn’t have come at a worse time as the virus arrived just as Zoe, along with other business owners and residents in the Ironbridge Gorge, were starting to recover from February’s devastating floods.

“The flooding restricted access to our shop and access for deliveries and collections. The impact on us was quite severe. Soon after the flooding, the pandemic started.

“We lost revenue from events and food festivals that we had booked to attend so we had to overcome that,” she tells Weekend.

Keen to adapt to the sudden changes to daily life and people’s shopping habits, Zoe brought forward her plans to launch a zero waste delivery service for refills of 1kg jars of nut butter. “We had trialled a Kilner refill service but the pandemic gave us the push to roll out more quickly and take the product to people’s doors,” she explains.

The service is currently offered to customers in Telford, Shrewsbury and Wolverhampton, but it’s sparked so much interest that the firm may look to widen the delivery area in the future.

“We’ve had a great response and we’ve had a lot of enquiries about it from people outside of the delivery area. It’s great for the planet because the jars are reusable, great for customers because it’s delivered to their door and great for us,” says Zoe.

She also made other changes to ensure the business could continue trading and support its regular and loyal customers.

“We have optimised our new website shop to include our whole range of nut and seed butters as well as special multi buy offers to help people with costs.

“We have seen our online sales increase fourfold since we initiated this change and there is still a huge demand for our nut and seed butters. It’s a challenging time, but it’s important to be adaptable where possible and we will continue to strive to deliver our nut and seed butters to those who are in need of them,” says Zoe.

See www.butterbelle.co.uk