Earlier this year the award-winning curry sauce and accompaniments producer won an export order to Germany after exhibiting at the world’s most important food and drink sector trade fair, Anuga.
Anila’s travelled with UK Trade & Investment to exhibit as part of the British Pavilion at Anuga in Cologne in October 2009.
Now the company run by Anila Vaghela has secured a second order as a result of contacts made at the trade fair and has started exporting to Switzerland for the first time.
A Swiss distributor has ordered more than 1,100 jars of curry sauces, chutneys and pickles from the firm, which is based in Walton-on-Thames with a unit in Hounslow, and is run by Anila and her husband Dan.
“This is great news for Anila’s Authentic Sauces,” said Anila Vaghela. “Exhibiting at Anuga marked the start of our push into exporting to Continental Europe, and I am delighted that this is now bearing fruit for us.”
The distributor has taken the whole of Anila’s range, which features eight premium curry sauces, handmade in small batches, and 16 chutneys, pickles and dips made with single fruits and vegetables.
Anila’s now exports to Germany, Ireland, Dubai and Switzerland, and hopes to continue expanding to other countries.
The news of the Switzerland order comes as Anila’s celebrates scooping a two ** Gold Great Taste Award for its popular Goan Green Curry Sauce.
The accolade marked the 11th Great Taste Award presented to Anila’s range of premium curry sauces, chutneys, pickles and dips by The Guild of Fine Food.
To win such a high rating, up to 20 judges unanimously agreed that the Goan Green Curry Sauce had achieved ‘absolute perfection’.
“The Goan Green Curry Sauce is one of our most popular sauces, and we are thoroughly delighted that the judges of the Great Taste Awards 2010 agree that it’s something very special,” said Anila, who founded Anila’s Authentic Sauces in 1997.
The Great Taste Awards are the national benchmark in speciality food and drink, and have been running since 1993.
Made with mint, coriander, spinach and coconut, Anila’s Goan Green Curry Sauce is sold in a range of speciality retailers, delis and farm shops.
Anila’s cooking has always been popular with friends and family, and in the early 1990s she began selling jars of curry sauce on a very small scale in her local community in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey. She sold all 80 jars at her first fair at Weybridge in 1992. Phone calls from very satisfied customers followed, and Anila began fulfilling small orders.
In 1997 she was made redundant from a job as a PA and decided to seize the opportunity to form her own company to develop Anila’s Authentic Sauces.
She carried out extensive research, took expert business advice, and felt there was a gap in the market for high-quality, premium curry sauces. She soon gained a listing in the food hall of her local department store, and before long Anila’s curry sauces were on the shelves of a range of health stores, delicatessens and independent specialist shops.
Anila outgrew her kitchen at home and moved to a catering kitchen in Surbiton in 2002. A year later the business needed larger premises once more, and Anila’s re-located to a 1400 sq ft unit in Hounslow. In 2006, husband Dan also joined the team.
Anila’s products are now sold at John Lewis Oxford Street and John Lewis Bluewater, and top quality gourmet stores, such as Harrods, Wholefoods and Planet Organic, plus hundreds of other outlets that include health food stores, garden centres and gift shops, as well as smaller independent stores such as Budgens at Ascot, Shepperton and Crouch End. Anila’s also sells direct to the public at 28 farmers’ markets across Surrey, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire, including Guildford, Walton, Windsor, Maidenhead, Ascot, Cobham, Beaconsfield and Farnham, and online via http://www.anilassauces.com/
