I have been very interested recently in what small businesses can do to survive this recession. It would appear to be affecting almost everybody. Talking to other small Irish food & drink producers we are also wondering what we can do to deliver good quality Irish food to Irish consumers at affordable prices. At Wild Orchard we have always endeavoured to provide top quality smoothies and juices at competitive prices and I know that many of our colleagues are the same. It appears, though, that somehow there is a disconnect between consumers and producers. As in, the consumers don't know we exist and we seem to struggle to make ourselves known. I am sure some of you are thinking "It's called marketing, you moron" and of course you are right and that's part of the problem. Most small Irish producers are just that, producers who are happiest developing, making or supplying. We always seem to neglect the whole marketing gig. Add that to the fact that our multinational competitors are very sophisticated in this area and it's not a big surprise that people don't know much about us. You'll see that here on the Wild Orchard website we are twittering, youtube-ing, flickring and facebooking and I hope that this will bring us into direct contact with more people who can let us know how we can become more relevant to their lives.
Any help or guidance will be much appreciated. Just email diarmuid@wildorchard.ie or phone 061 383930.