Sabor De Amor has signed a major supermarket deal and achieved a 40% rise in online sales during the coronavirus pandemic.
The popular Spanish sauce firm revealed Sainsbury’s will stock its Paella in a Bottle and Salsa Brava products at 70 of its stores from Monday February 15.
Based in Wrexham, director Dr Beatriz Albo said they are one of 10 producers nationwide to feature in the retailer’s Taste of the Future campaign and was proud of the progress made since launching the company in 2015.
She said Covid-19 had impacted upon their traditional sales at food festivals and events, but a surge in orders via their website and independent outlets – including farm shops across Wales and England – had given them a much-needed boost.
“Like most businesses we have been affected by the pandemic and had to adapt to new ways of working and a decline in revenue initially,” said Beatriz.
“But we have kept going and were determined to keep channels open with the leading suppliers and supermarkets interested in stocking our range of sauces before the coronavirus struck.
“We were already in discussions with Sainsbury’s and are delighted to get that deal done; it’s a proud moment for us, especially given we are one of just 10 producers in the country to be a part of this campaign, and the only one from North Wales.”
With the support of son Albert, Beatriz secured a contract for Sabor de Amor to be on the shelves of Sainsbury’s stores in Greater London, Yorkshire, the Midlands and the South East.
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She has built the range of salsas and sauces using family recipes to create incredible flavours, having arrived in North Wales from Salamanca, Spain, as a biology student in the early nineties.-
Plans for a new food service were scuppered by the initial lockdown in March last year, but she persevered and has big plans for the coming months, including the relaunch of an old favourite.
“A lot of people have been asking me to bring back the Sofrito slow roasted tomato sauce I produced years ago, so we will be doing that in the run up to summer,” said Beatriz, who was the winner of the BBC’s Top of the Shops series Sauces category in 2018.
“One of the positives we took from this challenging time is the feedback we have received from customers, especially those who bought our products because their holidays had been cancelled and they wanted to try and recreate that taste of the Mediterranean from home.”
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She added: “All we can do is thank our loyal customers and work hard to make a success of this new supermarket campaign and the other ideas we have in mind for the year ahead, depending on restrictions around the pandemic.
“If it goes well it could be rolled out to be even more stores, and then possibly nationwide, so we are hopeful and confident for the future.”
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