The Dorchester-based company, which produces flakes, granola, porridges, bars and slices as well as muesli, hired university graduates to help develop its marketing and production functions. And on the back of Bournemouth’s support, Dorset Cereals has nearly quadrupled the size of its business.
When MD Peter Farquhar arrived at Dorset Cereals in 2005, there was no marketing function – and having seen a story about another company that had worked with the university on a knowledge transfer programme, Farquhar got in touch with Bournemouth’s School of Services Management.
“We had an outrageous plan that would see us become the UK’s leading muesli provider, and together with the university we identified two big gaps that needed plugging,” said Farquhar. “One was around the relationship with our consumers, particularly the website, where we had no expertise in the business, and the second was around production capacity and processes which we needed to change to meet the planned volume growth.”
Bournemouth University graduate Harriet McKay – who has since been appointed as the company’s communications manager – was brought in to deliver the marketing support.
“When I started, the website was plain and there was no reason for customers to come back to the site,” said McKay. “I worked with the team at Dorset Cereals and their design agency to create a new website that would create more visits and communicate their brand values. Before the university’s involvement, the company had 16,000 emails on its database, now we have over 200,000. It’s been a fantastic success story.”
See Peter Farquhar in this entrepreneur forum video.
Source: Dorset Cereals
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