Stephen (MD)
Terry (Director)
Winterwood Farms Ltd.
Company Profile
Mission Statement;
"To give our customers as many types and varieties of soft fruit as are available, for as many months of the year as possible. Our commitment to suppliers is to 'grow' with them, and to develop opportunities with mutual co-operation."
Company Profile
Stephen started growing in 1978 and now the Company has 12 farms in 4 different countries. Due to its small beginnings, the company has always specialised in the niche market of the "other" berries such as Currants and Gooseberries, as well as out of season production. The company was one of the first companies in the UK, and maybe even the first, to grow Raspberries and Blackberries in tunnels, covering the first in 1978.
Winterwood Farms Ltd. achieves its goals by using its own central packhouse on its Farm in the South East of England (Maidstone, Kent) to co-ordinate growing, procurement and distribution of product. Fruit is sourced from other growers world-wide in 8 different countries to provide the continuity of supply required for an AYR business. The packhouse also packs the fruit from other PO members, in particular all the fruit from the PO's French member SARL Anjou Myrtilles and the PO's Polish member Polana Sp. Zo.o
All the fruit grown by Winterwood Farm is marketed by the Berryworld PO Ltd.
The fruit produced on the South African farms is marketed through Berryworld
Ltd.
The company is run as a "family business" which values the integrity and loyalty of not only
its suppliers and customers, but also its staff. It is owned and operated by Stephen Taylor
and wife Jackie, assisted by a dedicated staff that are continuing to be central to the
expansion of the business. Central to the efficiency of the packhouse and Farm is the
development of an integrated business, which enables seamless inter-changeability of staff
between packhouse and field. This enables the packhouse to quickly respond to changed or late
orders, and the farm to respond to sudden changes in either the weather or different levels
of orders for the different fruits being harvested.
The Team
Stephen's son Terry is the General Manager, and provides a central contact for the Company, whilst daughter Alison is in charge of all Administrative matters including order processing, assisted by Adam. Senior Technical Manager Alan Reeves with assistance from Richard, liaise closely with QA Manager Duncan, Stock Controller Jacek and QC's Pawel, John and Michal. All work closely with the Packhouse & Production Managers Tracy and Bruno.
Pawel has responsibility for allocating orders to the production area, whilst Sue, Sonia, Maxine, Kinga, Anna and Barbara supervise the packers. Kuba, Anna and Milos have the responsibility of ensuring that all labels are printed correctly and ready for use when the packhouse requires them and Waldek is in charge of making up all orders correctly.
Neil has recently joined to assist in all IT matters, web design etc. and we
welcome him to the company.
Farm Managers Tony and Rob are responsible for all aspects of the 3 farms outside the
packhouse, namely Winterwood, Haven and Coombe Farms, with the assistance of Sharron
who is responsible for staff matters, and also picking supervisors etc. as required on a
seasonal basis.
An extremely flexible workforce of around 100 packers and 80 pickers are employed on site
at any one time to give the customer what they want, when they want it.
Winterwood is proud of its multi lingual and multi cultural workforce, that
enable it communicate and work effectively in all its areas of interest,
particularly benefiting from its Spanish, French, Polish, Afrikans and Russian speaking
members of staff that mirror the Countries that the company is involved with, and
without whom communication would be a lot more difficult, even in this day an
age of e-mail!