The owners and staff of a Fife farm shop are celebrating winning two major awards within a week.
Ardross Farm Shop between Elie and St Monans has developed rapidly since it was founded in 2005 but remains family owned and run, with Nikki Storrar and her parents Rob and Fiona Pollock all involved in developing the business and the farming operation which backs it up.
Last week the shop was crowned as the best retailer in Scotland in the Farm Shop & Deli Awards.
Ardross was one of nine regional champions and was hailed by an expert judging panel for showing the highest levels of service, product knowledge, innovation and community involvement.
Nikki said: ‘We couldn’t ask for a better start to 2014. For us to win Best Retailer in Scotland through customer votes and a mystery shop was just the most wonderful feeling, it is unbelievable. Our team works very hard and this makes everything worthwhile.”
The Farm Shop & Deli Awards received a record number of entrants from nearly 300 businesses across the UK, along with thousands of public votes from consumers supporting their favourite speciality retailers.
BBC Radio 2’s Nigel Barden, chairman of the judging panel, said “I have travelled the length and breadth of country, from Northern Ireland to Scotland and right down to the deep depths of the south west, visiting large and small independent speciality retailers to identify our regional winners.
The nine regional champions will now contest a national final on March 24 at Birmingham’s NEC.
That might seem excitement enough, but there were more honours to come on Tuesday night when the Ardross team attended the Countryside Alliance Awards at Holyrood.
Dubbed as the ‘rural Oscars’, the competition saw Nikki and Fiona once again on the podium to collect the Scottish Local Food Champions award, with customer recommendations once again a crucial part of the judging process.
The farm shop at Ardross started in a small way. At the time Rob was becoming more and more disillusioned about prices for his beef cattle, and the idea of starting a retail operation started from there.
The farm in the fertile East Neuk was obviously ideal for growing vegetables and potatoes to increase the range of produce on offer, and before long the family had painted an old workshop which would become Ardross Farm Shop.
From these humble beginnings the operation has grown remarkably and now provides employment for 22 people.
Rob leads a team of five on the growing and farming side, three staff in the commercial kitchen and the others involved in the shop.
Nikki said: “The shop has just grown and grown and we are now serving just over 100,000 customers every year.
“We started the kitchen to add value to everything we produce so we have a range such as steak pies, mince rounds, soups, coulis, jams, cakes and so on.
“Everything we make is sold through the shop.”