Young Entrepreneur: fresh export opportunities simmering for 'Jam boy' - FreshFruitPortal.com

Young Entrepreneur: fresh export opportunities simmering for 'Jam boy'

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Young Entrepreneur: fresh export opportunities simmering for 'Jam boy'

A decade ago the fate of a 14-year-old Scottish boy was sealed during one ordinary afternoon learning jam recipes with his grandmother in the modest kitchen of a working class Glasgow home. Ten years of entrepreneurial spirit and a lot of fruit later, Fraser Doherty is CEO of SuperJam, a leading 100% fruit-only jam brand that sits on the shelves of 1,000 supermarkets across 12 different countries. In conversation with www.freshfruitportal.com, the man dubbed 'Jam boy' explains SuperJam's start-up success story.

Doherty is eternally grateful to his family for their unwavering support shown right from the very humble beginnings of his fruit-based business venture.

Fraser Doherty with jam jars.

Fraser Doherty with jam jars.

None more so than his gran, 76-year-old Susan Doherty, who will be his guest of honor when he attends a Royal ceremony to receive an MBE (Member of the British Empire) from the Queen of England for his services to the business world later this year.

It will be a very special day for the man, who has only just turned 25 and was named on the official Queen's Honourā€™s List earlier this week, representing recognition of his entrepreneurial work starting up SuperJam.

Today, SuperJam products ā€“ a variety of jams made entirely without sugar or preservatives ā€“ are sold throughout the world.

Doherty is looking to explore as many international markets as possible, setting his sights on China next.

"When I learned the recipes I didn't have any idea that jam making was going to go on to change my life. It just ended up being the start of my career and my whole life really," he tells www.freshfruitportal.com.

"I began selling to neighbors, local farmers markets and shops and step by step it grew until I left school when I was 16 and I was making jam every day until the point where I was making about 1,000 jars a week in my parents' kitchen.

"I came up with the idea to make jam that is 100% from fruit without adding any sugar or preservatives which is unusual because we all know that jam usually has a lot of sugar in it. When I did that it became my dream to get the products into the big supermarkets and at the time I didn't realize quite how difficult that was going to be."

After getting the chance to pitch to British supermarket chain Waitrose, Doherty began transforming his idea into a 'proper business'.

"They were having a 'meet the buyer day' which is like the X-Factor of selling groceries to supermarkets and at first they said 'no' and told me that I needed to do more work like set up a factory operation, get labels designed and do some more work on my recipes.Ā  He said to come back in year and maybe we'll give it a shot.

"So I spent a year convincing a factory to work with me to manufacture my products on a large scale, I got labels designed that explained to consumers why they should buy the products and eventually Waitrose agreed. They launched the jam in all 300 stores around the country about seven years ago."

Initially unsure of the uptake of SuperJam products, Doherty nervously waited but it wasnā€™t long before the signs of major success began to show.

International supply

"People eat jam all over the world and there are big opportunities in other countries, especially Asia where a lot of the jam brands are not established so it's quite easy to get a foothold and some traction like in South Korea where we are one of the biggest imported jams now and sales have grown by about 50%," Doherty says.

"Our biggest export market is South Korea followed by Denmark and we're selling in some stores in Hong Kong but it's not really that big at the moment. We also sell in Australia and we have just signed up a distributor in Spain. It's growing all of the time.

"I traveled to China recently because I'd love to sell the products there. I met with some people and am looking to develop a market. Hopefully it will not be too long before SuperJam is available in China."

Thousands of tons of fruit like strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, blackcurrants, get shipped into the two U.K. factories located in Scotland and Manchester, from Europe.

Dealing with so many different countries is tough so Doherty works with wholesale companies to handle the sourcing.

"The fruit we get has to be great quality of course and our partners who source it do a fantastic job and I let them get on with it.

"Originally when I made the first batch, I made about 12 jars of jam and now we make 50,000 jars in a batch so we buy thousands of tons of fruit these days."

The power of re-branding complemented by good marketing

SuperJam illustrates the power of good marketing and is a case in point of re-branding a traditional product to a global audience.

Originally it had a comic book theme marketed around the 'Super', but this distracted from the vital 100% fruit message. Following the advice of Waitrose and drawing influence from other sources too, Doherty's re-design showed a slick, high-end niche productĀ  with a big-game marketing plan.

"The idea of being able to take something so traditional like jam that may be normally considered a bit boring and old fashioned and turn it into a brand that is fun, modern and designed well is the key.

"This demonstrates that such an ordinary everyday product can, with the right effort, be completely re-invented. I like to think that weā€™ve done just that; re-invented something as old fashioned as jam and made it appealing."

Over the years Doherty has given 500 motivational speeches in around 30 countries and has made regular appearances of TV shows all over the world.

His range also includes SuperHoney, SuperTea and the SuperJam Cookbook.

www.freshfruitportal.com

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