Pip and Pear Chilled Baby Food was founded by Mum and Restaurateur, Irene Queally. Irene felt there was a demand for a convenient baby food range that was just like her own home-cooking; nutritious, tasty and filled with vibrant flavours and textures to ensure a healthy and happy baby.
Extensive Market Research
Extensive research was carried out during the product development stage. From recipes, flavours and textures to portion sizes and essential nutrients for baby, Irene worked closely with an experienced manufacturing partner in order to create a product range that babies and toddlers would love and parents could trust.
Consumer Behaviour
The Pip & Pear team spoke with parents and carried out focus groups in order to better understand what parents look for during those busy days when there isn’t enough time to cook from scratch. The majority of parents dedicate a day each week to batch cook and freeze their baby’s food. Pip & Pear encourages cooking at home and also offers advice and recipes on the company’s website. It was identified that feelings of guilt are experienced by many parents when it comes to all aspects of parenting, including feeding. Pip & Pear was therefore designed to be just like homemade and offering parents a guilt free alternative to their own home-cooking ensuring “all of the goodness and none of the guilt”.
Trends
New trends have emerged within the extensive prepared baby food sector which has led to the rise of long shelf life products to now include health & product claims on packs such as ‘low in salt’, ‘gluten free’ and ‘organic’. Research has shown that parents are becoming much more aware of what they are feeding their babies and the importance of nutrition from an early age.
Business Supports
Pip & Pear has utilised resources in Ireland such as Bórd Bia who offer fantastic advice, research and workshops regarding export, branding, new product development and more. Pip & Pear is also a verified member of Origin Green, a Bórd Bia initiative. This means that Pip & Pear has made concrete and verifiable commitments in accordance with the Origin Green sustainability charter to become a more sustainable producer. The Local Enterprise Office in Waterford, Ireland has also offered excellent support and expertise.
Availability & Exporting
Pip & Pear is available in the dairy fridge of all Aldi stores and selected SuperValu stores in Ireland and will be exported into the UK in the third quarter of 2017 and to Europe in 2018.
“Life is good and of course tremendously busy. My husband is extremely supportive and my children love to see Mum’s baby food on the shelves of the supermarket! It is hard work but also very rewarding and I can’t wait to see what the next year in business will bring.”
