‘It’s an exciting story that’s just beginning to unfold’

Dublin-based cider producer Orpens was founded in 2012 by wine merchants Chris Hill and Matthew Tindel. Its cider is made from fresh-pressed Irish apples and is stocked in Tesco, SuperValu and Dunnes Stores, as well as a wide range of restaurants, bars and off-licences around the country.

What sets your business apart from the competition? Our focus was to create a wine made from apples, as our background is in the wine business. Our product is very clean, very crisp and has a low sugar content. We're able to do that by working on bringing the fruit to the front of the experience. That's very much a winemaker's insight.

What's the best piece of business advice you've ever been given? The best piece of advice we got was actually a year-long course. We were part of the inaugural class of a programme called Food Works, an amazing collaboration between Bord Bia, Enterprise Ireland and Teagasc. We learned so much about everything to do with our business, from finance to marketing to distribution and sales.

But the real key learning from it was the networking – a huge proportion of the stakeholders now surrounding our business came directly from that programme.

What's the biggest mistake you've made in business? Someone once told me that most people starting up a business overestimate the short-term potential of the business and underestimate its long-term potential, and I'm afraid we fell into that trap as well. But things are really beginning to motor now and we've started exporting in significant quantities to Russia, Finland, the UK and South Africa.

And your major success to date? Winning awards is always great because they're important to the consumer, and the chain retailers – both independent and multiples – know that. Although we've only entered two competitions so far, we've won four awards. In the International Cider Challenge, a UK-based competition, we won the top trophy for our packaging, which was designed by my wife. We beat off all the competition to do that, so that was amazing.

What advice would you have for someone starting out in business? Always keep up with what's important to the consumer. For example, at the moment, we're focused on Christmas and planning all sort of things on the gastronomy side, such as showing how our cider can be used in recipes and sauces, paired with food, and used to make cider cocktails. The summer season in Ireland is about a week, so we have to make it a year-round beverage.

Who do you most admire in business and why? On the marketing side, I think Richard Branson is a genius.

In terms of spotting business opportunities that are relevant to the consumer and then creating a beverage, it has to be Bruce Jack, our cider maker. I couldn't believe it when he came on board. He really is an alchemist when it comes to making high-quality drinks out of fruit.

Based on your experience in the downturn, are the banks in Ireland open for business to SMEs? The banks are very defensive at the moment. Really, they're not going to help you unless you can guarantee that there is almost no risk to them. However, if you can show that, then they are open for business.

What one piece of advice would you give the Government to help stimulate the economy? While it's hard for the Government to identify each and every issue in every sector, there are issues in our industry. For example, the rate of duty on cider is really inhibiting its growth as an indigenous industry. There are 8,000 acres under orchards in Ireland and the apple growers are struggling to make a profit.

So what the Government needs to do is analyse areas that are fully indigenous and ensure they are given a leg-up to assist sustainable growth. The growth area in Ireland, other than technology, is in food and beverage. We need all the help we can get.

How do you see the short-term future for your business? What we've been doing so far this year is building distribution, because there's no point spending a lot of money communicating the relevant messages to your consumers if they don't know where they can get your product. Now we're focusing on communicating with our customers, putting them first and keeping them drinking the product they love.

Also, we’re going to bring another product onto the market before Christmas which is very exciting.

What's your business worth and would you sell it? The business isn't for sale. The team we've put together now is really, really strong. We're gaining recognition for our product. There's absolutely no way we're selling it. It's an exciting story that's just beginning to unfold. We really want to see it through.

In conversation with Caroline Madden