Sales of Fenton Farm’s coloured eggs have gone so well for Andrew Gabriel he is now looking for fellow farmers to supply him.
BFREPA member Andrew—who farms on the Devon and Somerset border—was dubbed the ‘smallest supermarket supplier in Britain’ when the Ranger visited him last May, having just secured a deal to supply his local branch of Waitrose—despite having only 1500 hens housed in vintage sheds.
But since then sales have gone from strength to strength. Not only are the packs—which contain a mixture of blue, brown and white eggs—selling well in Waitrose’s Sidmouth store and in a string of local shops, but once a week a hand-picked courier (who knows not to throw the parcels off the lorry) delivers the eggs to a growing number of top class outlets in London.
And to help keep up with demand Fenton Farm has invested in its production facilities, with a secondhand Liberty Livestock building, capable of housing 1000 hens and complete with automatic nests and chain feeder. But the traditional wooden houses and converted farm buildings, with their shaving-filled individual nests and hand-replenished feeders, are still pressed into use.
Andrew runs the farm—which also includes 150 acres of arable and beef—with very little help and with demand for the eggs increasing he has decided that business growth will be best served by contracting out some of the egg supply.
“Although I haven’t got large numbers of hens, they are kept in a fairly labour intensive way and grading and packing the eggs in a low-tech fashion is time consuming,” he told the Ranger.
“What I would like to do is find some local farmers prepared to keep, say, 500 or 1000 hens and supply me with the eggs while I concentrate more on the marketing.”
Andrew believes this is an opportunity that would not normally exist.
“I’m sure there must be farmers who would like to add a small free range enterprise to their farm but cannot do so because the major packers are only interested in large numbers.
“Alternatively, the only other way in is to have smaller flocks and market the eggs themselves, but that can be a very daunting prospect,” says Andrew, who intends to concentrate on producing the blues eggs and farm out the brown and white variety.
“The blue egg laying strains can be prone to inconsistent performance so if I stick to these and find other farmers to supply me with the white and brown eggs—which can come from hybrid layers—it will be less of a risk for anyone teaming up with me.”
Andrew says he can pay well above the going rate of the major packers and his suppliers will not have to register with the Lion or Freedom Food scheme.
Anyone wishing to know more can contact Andrew on 01823 672075 or visit www.fentonpoultry.co.uk
