A Cumbrian family business is modernising one of the county’s favourite sweet treats.
Kendal Mint Co is aiming to change the way people view Kendal Mint Cake by fusing heritage with cutting edge sports science to create modern versions of the original energy bar.
Jack Barker, 29, from Carlisle, first set up the business with his father Paul five years ago and has since overcome the pandemic to build up the now award-winning company.
The business now creates everything from science-backed sports gels, to energy bars and hydration supplements for serious and everyday athletes and adventurers – and Jack also has big plans to expand their product offering going forward.
But it all started with an idea to enhance Kendal Mint Cake for the modern athlete.
Jack said: “My family for around 30 years were involved in fresh food manufacturing and we used to make things like food to go stuff that you might see in Morrisons, healthy salads and that kind of thing.
“We know how to make good quality food and the standards required for doing that, and a few years ago through the Cumbrian food community my father heard one of the Kendal Mint Cake families was in some difficulty.
“So off the back of that we did a little research looking at how we could try and put Kendal Mint Cake back on the map where it deserves to be.
“We’ve always known about and loved Kendal Mint Cake, I’ve come from a bit of a sporty background myself as a swimmer and I’ve had a bit of experience using the products we now offer. I actually used to keep some Kendal Mint Cake in my bag when I was on poolside.
“But it was being lost as a touristy sweet treat and for my generation or younger, a lot of people don’t know what it is and see it as something your grandparents bring back off holiday or something your school teacher tells you to bring for DofE, rather than the way we now market it, which is as the original energy bar.”
Kendal Mint Co works in partnership with Quiggin’s – one of the Lake District’s oldest running Kendal Mint Cake brands that has been making the sweet treat for over 100 years.
While Kendal Mint Co make a range of sporting products – their mint cake energy bars are still made traditionally, only with a modern, sports nutrition twist.
Jack said: “We approached the oldest manufacturers of Kendal Mint Cake to work in partnership with them, so our KMC NRG recharged Kendal Mint Cake bar is still made in the same traditional way and hand-poured in Kendal, but with slight changes in our ingredients.
“On the manufacturing side of things, our products like our hydration and protein drinks and energy gels require an almost pharmaceutical level of manufacturing.
“But we have also been very conscious that this product needs to remain in Cumbria and Kendal. People know Kendal Mint Cake has a certain taste and texture and we shouldn’t mess with that.
“That’s something we feel pretty strongly about, which is why we work with Quiggin’s, who have been around for 100 years.”
Kendal Mint Cake is a product that has a long and winding history and was the energy bar of choice for both the first successful Trans – Antarctic Expedition and first British ascent of Mount Everest.
But the ingredients and manufacturing process for Kendal Mint Co’s upgraded version of the energy bar are designed to bring the treat up to date with modern energy bar standards and expectations.
Jack added: “We at first came up with a few different products, but it started with energy gels, which we felt was the natural evolution of an energy product for endurance athletes and adventurers.
“It’s that easy-to-take liquid form of energy and hydration that a lot of people want, so it started with that.
“The actual manufacturing process of our KMC NRG bar is almost identical in some ways, so it still tastes the same. We still have the fondant, granulated sugar and syrup brought to the boil before the peppermint oil is added in and blasts your eyes and sinuses.
“The only difference is the updated ingredients and it took a lot of work to try and not affect what we know and love about the original bar.
“The ingredients we use, we call it a ‘Jagerbomb ingredient’ that we drop in after the initial manufacturing process is done.
“So in that there’s salts, electrolytes that help with hydration, synapses firing between muscles and cramps and a blend of B vitamins that help break down carbs into the energy your body needs.
“The idea is to bring the KMC NRG bar as close to the functional purpose of an energy gel, while keeping the balance between the classic bar and bringing it up to date.”
Alongside their drive to recharge and improve Kendal Mint Cake for athletes – Jack said sustainability was one of Kendal Mint Co’s biggest key focuses.
He said: “Sustainability is my biggest passion, I have a really personal investment in it. When we first set up, we launched the gels and you’d go to these events like the Great Cumbrian Run, which was one of the first events we supported and you hand out products for people to try and test.
“Even though people don’t mean it, there ends up being a sea of tabs and plastic on the floor after. I’m really keen on sustainability myself and my impact, so straight from there we started working on recyclable and refillable formats of the gels.
“One of the most popular products we now do is a refillable version of the energy gels and we actually won a sustainability in running award for it.”
Jack added that he felt making sure a business is sustainable is slowly becoming a must for most businesses.
He said: “My take on it is that at one point for a lot of big companies it was a selling point, but honestly now I feel like from a customers point of view, it’s just expected.
“So with almost everything that we’re launching from now on, it will be at least fully recyclable if not fully biodegradable or refillable.
“It takes a bit of investment from us, but I feel like we’re also investing in the future. I think it will become an expectation with the laws being rolled out across the EU for packaging which I know will impact us at some point.
“But in general I would also say one of the biggest deciding factors for customers choosing us over another big sports gel brand is our sustainability.”
While many businesses work primarily selling their products online, Jack said the COVID-19 pandemic formed part of the driving force behind their decision to operate mainly online.
He said: “We’ve come from this more traditional food to go business so we expected to just be able to launch Kendal Mint Co, do a bit of marketing and launch the products into loads of shops, but it’s quite a specialist product.
“We also launched just a few months before COVID hit, which forced us to be entirely online during that time. We lost a lot of stock, and it forced us to rebuild, but working online has been a good thing as working directly with your consumers you get instant feedback.
@kendalmintco Ben gives the citrus and mint-flavoured ISO MIX a try. "It’s lovely, better than most sticky gels!" 🍋🌿 An honest review straight from the man himself. Have you tried KMC ISO MIX? #TasteTest #CitrusMint #HydrationMix #KendalMintCo #KMCISOMIX #Kendalmint #Energydrink #electrolytes #hydration #sportsnutrition #running #runningnutrition ♬ original sound – Kendal Mint Co
“It comes straight back to you rather than to a shop and you can measure your success a lot more easily, but it can be a little more costly.
“So over the years we’ve really focused in on that and building the brand rather than focus on retail shops and distributors.
“We’ve focused on building the brand, our social media and awareness around our products which has then created demand, but we do also have several independent shops across the UK that sell it.
“These products aren’t really an impulse buy, you wouldn’t walk into a shop and think oh I’ll just take that. We find if someone is looking to choose nutrition and energy products they visit the website three or four times and search before they make a decision.
“So investment in education content so the customer can be informed and make their own mind up is really important to us.”
More recently, Jack said he has focused energy into producing video content for social media to support customers in better understanding their products.
Kendal Mint Co also works with national and local athletes like international triathlete Fraser Minnican and GB sprinter Stacey Downie to promote their products and show support for their sporting journeys.
Jack said: “The videos we do on social media are honestly something I didn’t really like doing. I’m quite happy stood in front of a crowd talking about products and nutrition, but it is hard to put yourself in front of a camera.
“The way I saw it was I can stand at a national running show for a crowd of 30 to 40 people and talk about why we might be the best choice to help them get their next PB, so why not start doing it in a video for millions to see as well.
“It took years into the business for that to click and we just had a bit of a let’s do it moment, so at the start of this year we just went all in and it’s been hugely successful.
“We’re four times up in business revenue and I would put more than 90 per cent of that down to our new marketing.”
Jack said that ultimately, he believes that it is Kendal Mint Co’s sustainability and personal touch that make it stand out from the crowd.
He added: “We’re very lucky to have that heritage of Kendal Mint Cake behind us and the fact that we work with Quiggin’s and have that association with being the original energy bar is just fantastic.
“From customer feedback the sustainability of our products is a huge draw and as a small British business, there’s so many people from the events we go to that we recognise them from orders, which I think people really like too.”
