>>Who's at the cutting edge of NPD?
Product:: Micro Meal
Company: Minara Foods
Launch date: August 2004
It was the two children of Minara Cook, the founder of Minara Foods, who initially came up with the idea for the Micro Meal range when, after watching a TV ad for Pot Noodle, they suggested their mum should make her own heat-and-eat meal.
Launched into 500 Tesco stores in August, the range consists of three twin-pot Indian meals - chicken biriani with vegetable balti sauce, chicken biriani with korma sauce, and vegetable biriani with a tomato and red pepper sauce.
Aimed in particular at office workers who have no access to a fridge at work but would like a hot meal for lunch, the gluten, nut and wheat-free meals can be microwaved in three minutes.
“I chose biriani because it’s a lively dish with delicate flavours and, as far as I know, no one makes one as a ready meal,” says Cook. “Rather than use dried ingredients, or produce something in a single container, I wanted to use fresh ingredients and keep the sauce and the rice apart so the quality on eating was as good as we had produced in our test kitchen.”
Cook, whose £1m company also produces curry sauces and pastes for some Tesco stores in the north-west, says she hopes that Micro Meal will become a £500,000 brand in its first year. “Initial sales figures suggest we are on track to achieve this.”
The company, which was set up in 1999, is keen to get as broad a distribution as possible and is looking at potential brokers to help it.
Product:: Micro Meal
Company: Minara Foods
Launch date: August 2004
It was the two children of Minara Cook, the founder of Minara Foods, who initially came up with the idea for the Micro Meal range when, after watching a TV ad for Pot Noodle, they suggested their mum should make her own heat-and-eat meal.
Launched into 500 Tesco stores in August, the range consists of three twin-pot Indian meals - chicken biriani with vegetable balti sauce, chicken biriani with korma sauce, and vegetable biriani with a tomato and red pepper sauce.
Aimed in particular at office workers who have no access to a fridge at work but would like a hot meal for lunch, the gluten, nut and wheat-free meals can be microwaved in three minutes.
“I chose biriani because it’s a lively dish with delicate flavours and, as far as I know, no one makes one as a ready meal,” says Cook. “Rather than use dried ingredients, or produce something in a single container, I wanted to use fresh ingredients and keep the sauce and the rice apart so the quality on eating was as good as we had produced in our test kitchen.”
Cook, whose £1m company also produces curry sauces and pastes for some Tesco stores in the north-west, says she hopes that Micro Meal will become a £500,000 brand in its first year. “Initial sales figures suggest we are on track to achieve this.”
The company, which was set up in 1999, is keen to get as broad a distribution as possible and is looking at potential brokers to help it.
No comments yet