Three Tipperary Businesses Shortlisted For RTE Show
Veronica Molloy with her award
Crossogue Preserves, Lough Derg Chocolates and Wheelokit are three Tipperary based businesses who have been shortlisted in a competition to give small businesses in Ireland the opportunity to get their products on television for the first time.
Crossogue Preserves, Lough Derg Chocolates and Wheelokit are three Tipperary based businesses who have been shortlisted in a competition to give small businesses in Ireland the opportunity to get their products on television for the first time.
The €60,000 ‘Your Business on Irish TV’ competition is a joint initiative between Shopping from Home, a home shopping series aired on RTÉ and the County and City Enterprise Boards.
In all, 20 small businesses from around the country have been short-listed for the six top prizes, which are monthly presentation packages on Shopping from Home worth €10,000 each.
The twenty finalists are all award-winning Irish businesses in their own right, which have been nominated by their local County and City Enterprise Board.
Veronica Molloy of Crossogue Preserves is excited to be shortlisted out of a group that includes Waterford Crystal and Connemara Marble.
Veronica, who is originally from East Africa and whose mother is from Kilsheelan said: “I’ve been making jams and chutneys for over 16 years. I learned most of my cooking from my mother-in-law and a lot of the recipes we started out with would have been passed down through the generations.”
Veronica met her husband, Tony, on a visit to Ireland some years ago, and with six kids on a farm, making jams started out as a hobby. She then moved on to selling her produce at the local country markets and soon local businesses were stocking her produce in their stores.
Crossogue Preserves is now available in the USA and England, online at crossoguepreserves.ie and the Ballycahill based business currently employs six Tipperary people.
“If we were to go on to be part of the six finalists, my aim would be to showcase what people can do with our products, get the brand out there and support Irish,” adds Ms Molloy.
The business has won over 30 awards at the Great Taste Awards in the UK and Crossogue Preserves are stocked nationwide in Avoca, the Kilkenny Shop and Superquinn stores.
Lough Derg Chocolates based in Newtown, Nenagh are a relatively new business, just having launched in November.
Elaine and Malachy Dorris became redundant in 2010 and with three children under the age of four, they knew they had to do something.
Elaine said: “I began doing intensive market research online and kind of landed on the chocolate industry. Malachy, my husband took some chocolate-making classes.”
Since then, with the help of funding from North Tipperary County Enterprise Board, they have built a new production unit by their house on the shores of Lough Derg.
The North Tipperary CEB put the Dorrises in touch with a mentor, Ruth McGarry Quinn, who owns Torc Café in Longford, and she gave them some sound advice which led them to redesign their packaging and branding.
Having recently won at an award for New Emerging Business North Tipperary, they are delighted to be shortlisted for the RTE show.
Being one of the final six would go a long way in getting the Lough Derg brand out there as Elaine and Malachy would ideally like to sell their products nationwide and eventually export.
The artisan chocolatiers have luxury chocolate selection boxes, truffle pouches, bars and lollies which are stocked in selected stores around the county and available at loughdergchocolates.ie.
The judging process to select the final six begins next week and the winners are expected to be announced in the middle of August. Screentime ShinAwil, the production company behind The Apprentice, MasterChef Ireland, Dragons’ Den and The Voice, will film the first presentation in August, which will then be beamed into thousands of Irish households on RTÉ 1 from September.
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Friday 24 May 2013
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