About Us
We are not just growers, we are experts who have perfected the art of growing blackcurrants, implementing a complicated methodology and responding to the consumers’ growing demands for environmental conscientiousness and responsible husbandry.
We now grow around 2,000 hectares of blackcurrants in the British Isles, producing a crop of over 13,000 tonnes every year.
Jo Hilditch - Chairman
Jo has been running her family farm for around 10 years. Blackcurrants have been a staple crop since the 1930's when her grandfather planted one of the first plantations in Herefordshire and she now supplies Ribena, Pixley Berries and will be launching her own creme de cassis product this autumn. Other crops on her mixed farm include cider apples, potatoes and an arable rotation. Jo began a whole farm environmental stewardship in 1997 and is committed to maintaining the beautiful Herefordshire landscape.
Anthony Snell - Board Member
Anthony produces and packs fresh and frozen soft fruit in partnership with his wife Christine in South Herefordshire. Their conventional and organic blackcurrant business involves primarily supplying processing fruit for Ribena, but also producing ‘strigged’ IQF frozen fruit for yoghurt and ice-cream makers, and mixed fruit packs for Marks and Spencer. Anthony is Chairman of the N.F.U. West Midland Horticulture Board, as well as being a member of the National Horticulture Board. He is also a board member of soft fruit cooperative K.G. Growers. In 2008 the business was voted ‘UK Soft Fruit Grower of The year’.
Edward Keene - Board Member
Edward Keene runs the family farm in Gloucestershire, which specialises in growing crops for UK processing Companies. He is a third generation blackcurrant grower, his Grandfather and Father having introduced the crop to the farm in the 1950's to supply blackcurrants to Ribena. He is chairman of Blackcurrants UK, which has been established to look after the interests of growers at a national level. Other enterprises on his farm include apples, sugar beet and cereals.
Chris Alhusen - Board Member
Chris has been running the family farm in the beautiful gently rolling countryside of central Norfolk for 25 years. They have been growing Blackcurrants since 1951. Before mechanical harvesting, their hand picked crop supplied a huge range of jam, jelly and pie manufacturers; now they grow exclusively for Ribena. They also grow a range of arable crops. Chris is very interested and involved in environmental management, and is committed to improving the countryside in which we all live.
John Hinchliff - Board Member
John has been running the family farm based at Canterbury in Kent since 1982 and has been growing blackcurrants for processing from about this time. The farm also grows Strawberries, Apples and Pears for the fresh market.