We often do food product development work for companies and have a very flexible approach. We are happy to do everything from concept development right through to putting the product on a supermarket shelf – there isn’t a step we’ve not done before.

Product development can get very expensive very quickly, and it doesn’t need to most of the time. A typical project starts with a literature search and we have a dedicated, university based researcher. If the info is out there, its unlikely he won’t find it. With the right guidance, a project will have its best chance of heading off in the right direction.

It’s also important to make sure that there aren’t any big flaws with the ideas. We’re not afraid to tell people if an idea just won’t work and will never work. Having a robust strategy from the outset is essential for success.

We find the best approach is for us to do the initial development and throw all our ideas into getting a prototype that we hand over to the client to refine. This usually happens relatively rapidly. This allows th client to maximise our value, while being able to keep the incremental improvements, which can take a long time, from costing too much.

Once the client is happy with the product, we can then get going on the technical tasks of things like labelling, compliance and frankly, all the other boring stuff.

At any stage we’re happy for the client to take over to save money, or to jump back in and do some more work – with one exception. We won’t work on a product that isn’t safe, and we are quite often presented with ideas that simply cannot work. Sometimes there is a good reason why “this has never been done before anywhere in the world!”

With some clients, we just give them a push in the right direction and essentially offer a coaching service over the phone from that point onwards, and do things like advise who to call for specialised ingredients. Recently we provided a customer with 1 on 1 training on how to make a certain type of product and that work was particularly successful.

Give us a call to discuss your needs – 0800 475 463.