A Kendal-based husband-and-wife team have described how Covid provided a silver lining for their sandwich operation, leading to increased sales across Cumbria.
Mel and Scott Walmsley started Riverbank Catering in Kendal in 2008, after they felt there was a gap in the market for food on the go catering, focusing on quality Cumbrian ingredients.
The company was created in Mel’s mum and dad’s kitchen in Kendal, serving a market for weddings and local events, eventually diversifying into sandwiches, a niche which due to a series of chance events meant they would soon be propelling their business dramatically forward.
Expanding into premises at Dockray Hall Industrial Estate in 2011, things were picking up – however it was a new client which provided an even bigger spark for success.
“In 2014 we were asked by a local retailer, Premier – Lakes Movies on Wildman Street in Kendal, if we could do pre-packaged sandwiches, because their current supplier was stopping delivering in the area,” says Mel.
“We managed to get a little piece of software, for labelling, and started producing basic pre-packed sandwiches. We only did it for that customer, we only did it as a favour. We never really thought it would grow into what it did, but it just grew organically.”
From about 2015 onwards their pre-packed sandwich services gathered momentum.
However, surprisingly, the real upswing in their fortunes occurred when the Covid pandemic hit.
Despite the sudden, catastrophic impact of Covid, the pandemic became a perfect storm that provided a silver lining.
Mel says: “The turning point for us – when Covid hit we lost all our business overnight. All the catering, we had to close the premises, we just had nothing, it was a very scary time. We had to furlough all of our staff.
“But as it turned out we had a lot of enquiries for pre-packed sandwiches because the major suppliers stopped delivering in our area. And when they did start delivering they were very, very selective about where they were going. They picked out a main route to deliver and that was it.
“So a lot of companies that we were trying to get into for years, local garages and shops and things they were actually coming back to us now and saying can you help us? and literally in two weeks it just went crazy, and so we brought back nearly all of the team, which was great and kept going with that.
“And so when we came out of Covid, our business had flipped from 30 per cent pre-packed sandwiches and 70 per cent the outside catering, to the other way around.
“We honoured all the existing bookings we had for weddings and different things – but after the first 12 months – we thought this is what we want to do now. In 2022, we totally rebranded as Lakes Sandwiches and stopped doing outside catering.”
Since then the company has been flying, expanding its business that also vitally supports other Cumbrian businesses who provide its sandwich fillings.
Miraculously, when the pandemic hit, within a few weeks their pre-packed sales had increased by around 30 per cent from new custom. Now, post-Covid, they have nearly doubled their turnover from pre-pandemic and are continuing to expand with new clients.
Mel, a former accountant, feels vindicated for what was a change of career for both her and her husband, Scott previously working in the building industry.
The pair had simply followed their passion as a food obsessed couple who had a dream of creating a company using locally sourced ingredients.
It was a tough few years, as for any business with Covid, Brexit, the inflation and energy crisis thrown in the mix, but for Mel there was always light at the end of the tunnel.
She says: “It has been very, very testing. At times we have thought why are we doing this? It has been really hard.
“It feels like now this year, it is a tipping point that everything we have put into it is now starting to pay off. The decisions we have made are coming good for us.
“In every business it has been hard the last few years with everything we have tackled. It really has been tough and it is those moments that put everything in perspective for you and you have that moment where ‘yes that is why we are doing it’. This is what we are striving for. Especially for the team. It has been such a big buzz for the team.”
Along with Mel and Scott, the company now has 11 staff on its books and continues to pride itself on its handmade products and local ingredients, a growing reputation that has recently garnered a Best Locally-Sourced Packaged Sandwich Company award in the 2024 Business Elite Awards.
“We are still very, very hand-made, we are very low on automated processes, everything is done by hand,” says Mel. “We like that process, it helps us check the quality. That is the difference we are going for. We really want our products, our fillings to be handmade and handmixed.
“Predominantly we like to use locally sourced ingredients. A key partner we have worked with from the start is Hawkshead Relish. We use them for all our chutneys and fillings. We try to make sure that all of our produce or our suppliers are within a 30-mile radius so we keep everything really, really local,” says Mel.
Lakes Sandwiches delivers to businesses around the South Lakes, throughout the Lakes and Cumbria.
“We go to Grasmere, Ambleside, Windermere, Glenridding, Ullswater. We have had a route out to Carlisle as well. We have a massive region.
“Our main retailers are convenience shops and we support garages, which are still locally owned which is nice, Kirkby Motors, Kirkby Londsdale; Canal Garage at Crooklands; Lound Road Garage at Kendal.
“We have a lot of little stops, we picked up a new retailer recently Witherslack Community Shop, they just wanted to try our sandwiches and that has been going really well, they have been selling out.
“It is something me and my husband are passionate about, we love it, we love everything to do with food. Also because we love where we live and we love our county.
“We think it is amazing for the food producers around here. So it was a case of let’s do something and put locally sourced catering in it and let people know about where it is and where they can get it.
“The stories about those people and what they do, the local farm that makes the cheese and the local firm that makes the chutney and what their story is – and literally since then we have just been growing with it.”
