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Emerging from two traditional Scottish enterprises in 1995, Paterson which produced oatcakes since 1895 and Arran Fine Foods which was founded in the 1970s producing high quality mustard, Paterson Arran today is an owner managed company with 170 employees that produces various kinds of biscuits and shortbread together with mustards, relishes, salad dressings, preserves and marmalades. The size of the company is now such that Arran Fine Foods produces 7 million pots of product annually and the biscuit bakery has the capacity to produce 20 million pieces per week.
The company is very innovative in that it invests a considerable amount per year for modern equipment and for research and development. Being the market leader in healthy biscuits in Great Britain, the company focuses on healthy shortbreads and biscuits, especially oat biscuits with very high oat content. The company holds a licence for slimming products and has an organic certification. It is also quality certified according to the highest possible level and won several prices for high quality and tasty products, such as the Best Organic Biscuits Award in 2005.
The products, among 85 kinds of biscuits, are sold and distributed to high class supermarkets under three different labels and are also exported to 45 countries worldwide. A few of the main markets besides the UK are the USA, Canada, Japan, Spain and France. The company is fast growing with a rate of 8% in general and even 20% in the oat biscuits sector.
In the project, Pat-Arran will develop cholesterol-lowering biscuits and shortbread. They are mostly interested in healthy ingredients from oat and lupine as this perfectly complements the healthy biscuits product range. The launching of the new biscuits will be within 6 months after the end of the project due to pre-existing marketing and will help the company maintaining the high growth rate in healthy biscuits of 20% for another 3 - 4 years. With the new products, Paterson Arran expects an additional turnover of € 300.000 - 400.000 in the first year. Alan Hardie, general manager, will co-ordinate the activities of Pat-Arran and Dr. John Foard, development manager, will develop the biscuits and scale up the process.
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