A Cumbrian cider and perry firm’s production bottleneck has been eased thanks to support from the county’s business growth hub.
Broughton Bank Perry and Cider, near Cartmel, was set up by John Hibbert who plants, picks and presses apples and pears to make cider and perry.
John started planting trees in 2007 to provide secondary resource and improve soil quality for livestock grazing.
Over time, the vision expanded – from timber to nut trees, and then to fruit. Rather than entering the fresh fruit market, John decided to grow perry pears and cider apples hoping to support an existing local cider making business.
When that business closed down, there was little alternative to start producing cider on site and Broughton Bank Perry and Cider was born.
John wanted to create a fully vertical business: growing and processing fruit, and handling production in-house.
Everything was done by hand from picking the fruit to designing the labels on the bottles.
By 2015 small harvests and product development began, then in 2017 the product met acceptable standards. Training at Kendal College led to gaining an alcohol license in 2018.
The proof of the formula was shown when the International Wine & Spirits Competition awarded John’s medium cider Bronze in 2022 and Gold in 2023.
Last year brought the IWSC Bronze for the medium perry. The medium cider was voted Best in Festival at the 2022 Ulverston CAMRA Festival.
As the business grew a significant bottleneck in John’s production process became apparent – all of the fruit had to be lifted by hand into the crushing hopper.
With production rising to 3,000 litres of juice, the processing of around 15 cubic metres of apples was physically exhausting. The manual process made it difficult to scale up the business.
Some form of mechanical support was needed so John decided to buy a conveyer to lift fruit into the crushing hopper.
To help fund the project, John contacted Cumbria Business Growth Hub about grant funding support and applied for a capital grant funded by the Rural England Prosperity Fund, provided by Westmorland & Furness Council.
He was awarded a grant of over £3,600 towards the cost.
John said: “The grant application was straightforward. Initially I was not confident of success as I hadn’t done that sort of thing before.
“But at every stage I was given advice when I asked. Items which might have become difficult hurdles were simplified and adapted to the size of business, technology and information available.”
He said the introduction of the conveyor had significantly eased the production workload and physical strain on staff and the increased productivity has afforded him time to reorganise workspaces, and further streamline operations.
John said: “It’s been really uplifting to know that there’s this kind of support available administered by the helpful people administering it.
“The knowledge that the business is something that national and especially county institutions want to encourage is really positive, and helps with those times when people in small businesses can feel quite isolated.”
For more information, visit https://cumbriagrowthhub.co.uk/
