The Food Lover’s Market Seeds of Change Supplier Development Programme, launched in January 2021, is a Food Lovers’ Market initiative in collaboration with the Social Enterprise Academy. The programme invited socially-minded entrepreneurs to apply to become suppliers to FLM. It was open to all social enterprises. “We received close to 900 applications but after a thorough selection process that included a two-day webinar, submission of assignments, a week-long boot camp for the top 10 enterprises, and a final pitching event judged by a panel of Food Lover’s top brass and senior buyers, a winner was announced,” says Siglinda Losch, Group Sustainability Manager at FLM.
The Village Market was selected as the winning supplier! It is a social enterprise established to address decreasing bee populations and aims to combat rural poverty through establishing bee initiatives in remote African villages – linking conservation of natural resources, rural producer initiatives and markets. Founded by Portia Morudi, The Village Market’s honey was introduced to stores in early November.
As the Top 10 Seeds of Change finalists were all so accomplished and impressed the judges, Food Lover’s Market decided to support further communities by introducing some of their products in-store. They have also been mentored on marketing, logistics, and how to develop their product and get it listed in our stores and ready for sale! We are extremely proud to announce that 3 of our top ten winners’ products hit our shelves in early November. Here they are:
Noju Honey
Noju Honey, which directly translates as ‘mother honey’, represents nurturing and bringing livelihoods to communities and giving life to forests. Portia Morudi from The Village Market – our ultimate winner – has created this honey product which is available at Inland stores.
Chuck Chilli
Chuck Chilli is made from fresh chillies using an original family recipe with a secret ingredient…#bewarethekick! The owner of Chuck Chilli, Boikano Sikwane has employed staff from the community of Diepsloot and all ingredients are sourced from smallholder farmers that comply with agricultural practices. Chuck Chilli dispose of food waste as it gets used for composting with them. Chuck Chilli will be available at stores nationwide. Thank you to Brian Robberts, Buyer at FLM, for seeing the potential and listing this product.
Loxtonia Cider
Loxtonia Cider is a range of ciders that is stocked in six of our Market Liquor stores. Loxtonia used hand-picked apples to create a great cider product, straight from the orchard. It is preservative-free, gluten-free, vegan-friendly and natural. From soil straight to sip. The cider is bottled in a facility that uses greywater, and solar energy and is a family business with sustainability, loyalty and integrity at its core. Their social impact has been massive as they have given parts of the farm to the surrounding community and assisted, trained and mentored them to farm apples.
These incredible products are not only delicious but help to change lives! Please help these social entrepreneurs by learning about their products and promoting them in your stores!
