(4 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
Loading...By Kim Havelaar, Founder of Roqberry
Before it wins a Great Taste Award your food product will be blind-tasted and judged by some of the most demanding food critics, restaurateurs, chefs, cooks, and producers, as well as food writers and journalists.
After this extensive process, when customers see the distinctive black and gold Great Taste label they know they can expect a wonderful tasting product. One star is given for products that deliver fantastic flavor, while two stars are reserved for those that are above and beyond delicious.
In just over 18 months, Roqberry has won an incredible 20 Great Taste Awards for our specialty tea, so I’ve learned something about what will impress judges.
Create Big, Bold Flavors
When we launched Roqberry, we were foodies wanting to ‘blend the rules’ around what tea is, what it could be, and when it could be drunk. We wanted tea to complement our food, which is a bit unusual, especially in the UK.
This required bold flavors so that the tea could hold its own when paired with rich foods and not be reliant on milk which softens the flavor. For example, our Sushi & Spice and Raspberry Fondant both won two stars.
So, my advice is to not be afraid of flavor. Don’t settle for making something tasty yet boring if you could make something delicious and outstanding.
Trust Your Own Palate
I am often asked, how I know when a new flavor is award-winning. The truth is, I don’t. We create tea blends that we like and work from there. Which brings me to my next tip: trust your own palate!
By creating something that you love, there’s an excellent chance you’ll be creating something someone else will love too! The important criterion to focus on is the flavor. A tea could look good and smell good, we may have even thought up the perfect name for it, but, if it didn’t deliver flavor, it was dismissed.
I recommend that you give yourself a set amount of time to allow your creative juices to flow. Play around with ideas, take inspiration from a number of sources, and don’t be downhearted if it doesn’t taste great on your first try. Some of the best flavors we’ve created have been the result of a number of iterations ‒ we keep working until it tastes just right…to us. Then we get feedback from our customers.
Be Prepared to Make Tough Decisions
Of course, the balance to the point above is that you also need to cut any flavors that don’t prove popular with your customers. They are your ultimate taste-makers.
Just because you created flavors with love and care doesn’t mean you should keep them in your range. We use events and trade-shows to test our new flavors on our customers. People vote with their wallet and if we sell out of a product by sampling it, we know we are on to a winner.
We will discontinue the least popular product, even if it is one of our personal favorites. This helps continuously raise the standard of our teas, ensuring every of them meets the standard for great taste.
Push to Create Something Outstanding
One more point on flavor (after all, it’s the most important thing) ‒ you must push the boundaries if you want to create a truly outstanding product.
It’s far better for some customers to absolutely LOVE a product and for others not to care for it than to create something mediocre. And truly unique products will never satisfy everyone’s preferences. At least if you have a unique product that some customers love then you have a captive audience for that range. Other customers will prefer other unique flavors, so it’ll all work out in the end and customers will have a wide range of products to explore!
Use the Best Quality Ingredients
When managing a food or beverage company, there are lots of strategic and commercial decisions you will need to make. One thing you should never compromise, however, is the quality of your ingredients.
Even if you have a delicious recipe, using cheap ingredients will compromise the flavor and overall quality of the product. Eating and drinking is about the entire experience ‒ cheapening the ingredients cheapens the experience. Cheap experiences do not win Great Taste Awards.
For example, for the tea bags themselves, we opted for natural materials over the plastic teabags used by cheaper brands. Not only did this decision help preserve the flavor of the tea, but it also helped get Roqberry noticed by the mainstream press.
My advice: if you have an option, always go for the higher quality ingredients. Customers will prefer it and the Great Taste judges, with their impeccable palate, will certainly appreciate it.
By making something with care and attention you’ll create products that you and other people will love. Test what you create on your customers, refining as you go, and be brave enough to drop what isn’t working. By taking this approach you’ll develop a wide range of great-tasting products that have an excellent chance of impressing the judges of the Great Taste Awards.
Kim Havelaar is the founder and Managing Director of Roqberry. Kim spent 15 years at GE working across a variety of industries and holding senior leadership roles in Commercial Operations and Strategy. She also holds a Masters in Business Administration and in International Management (RSM/ESADE). Kim runs the day-to-day operations of Roqberry and has also qualified as a tea sommelier.
The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer or company.
Related Posts
By Richard Horwell, Brand RelationsCreating an alcoholic drink is not easy. Only one in ten new alcohol drinks business ventures will survive beyond t...
By Richard Horwell, Brand Relations Having been behind over 100 brands, I have seen far too many entrepreneurs think they can handle the sales and mar...
By Erik Wolf, Executive Director, World Food Travel AssociationThe hospitality industry has had a tough time recently. The sector is dealing with new ...
By Richard Horwell, Brand Relations There are fantastic opportunities for the right manufacturer to dominate the alcohol-free spirits’ space. However,...