Member Article

Durham coffee innovators scoop Sainsbury’s deal

Two North East coffee entrepreneurs will be able to supply nearly 550 Sainsbury’s stores nationwide, following investment.

John Evans and Mark Porteous, the men behind Durham-based Beanies The Flavour Co, have secured the lucrative positioning with the supermarket giant and are expanding as a result.

The investment comes from the Finance for Business North East Angel Fund, which is managed by Rivers Capital Partners.

Beanies stray from traditional methods of flavouring coffees, which typically use syrups and coatings, by directly infusing flavours into the coffee itself.

The firm have also been supplying traders as far afield as South Africa and Denmark, and now offer 30 flavours from their website.

Natalia Blagburn, who headed the investment on behalf of Rivers Capital, said: “The people behind Beanies epitomise exactly what we look for in a company; not only do they have a fantastic product, but they have the drive and passion to take it to the world – proven by their amazing successes with Sainsbury’s!”

Mark Porteous of Beanies, who first began flavouring coffee in his garage 5 years ago, said “The help from Rivers Capital really benefited us in acquiring the deal with Sainsbury’s, and it marks the start of big things for Beanies; we’ve got a lot of vision for this company and there’s plenty more to come.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .