Irish Food ........ my A*se!

lanod2407

Anyone else getting increasingly angry with the misleading marketing of "Irish food"???

I thought that a food brand that relates to the origin of the food - e.g. "Charleville Cheese" needs to be made in that area? But this isn't so ..........

- Old Time IRISH Marmalade .......... made in the UK!

- Bolands of Ireland biscuits ......... made in the UK

- Charleville Cheese .......... yes, I'm serious - made in the UK!

- here's a beauty - Strathroy milk carries the Guaranteed Irish label, and when you spin the carton around and look for the little circle containing the country of origin .......... how did you guess - "UK"!!!

- I wrote to the Advertising Authority a while back highlighting that Kerry are advertising with a slogan "Kerrygold - made OF Ireland", which leads people to believe that the product is made in Ireland via a play with words, where in reality more and more of their butters, especially butter substitute spreads, are being made in the UK. One of the key cost advantages here is that Kerry can ship product made here to the UK, and then they have a full load back to Ireland of product made in the UK, with the Kerry brand. A lot of logistics savings on back-loads.
I got a reply declining my request for them to take action - they didn't see any problem with misleading advertising!

There are so many more examples, but I don't want to send you into a coma just yet!!

This has got to be costing us jobs in terms of people buying what they assume to be Irish food.

Does anyone else think that we're getting misled .............. or are we bothered?

whelan1

wasnt there something about denny too?

Muckit

I wouldn't eat a denny sausage if i was paid. Pure sh*t

But back to the OP original point. Yes we as consumers are being constantly 'tricked' with fancy advertising and misleading packaging. I definitely look more into what and where my food comes from.

At the end of the day though, it all comes down to one thing..... MONEY. Both from a consumer and a sales point of view.

Caroline N

If you want to know what's really made in Ireland, check out the Love Irish Food website - they've very strict rules of what brands can have their logo. http://www.loveirishfood.ie

lanod2407

Just had a look in the fridge .......... Avonmore Sour Cream ...... UK.


which reminds me of a trip to Tesco a few years back when I asked one of the staff if they stocked sour cream. "No love", she replied, "all our cream is fresh"!
That put me back in my place!


If anyone else is close to the fridge or cupboard ..... take a look and let us know if there are any "foreign nationals" in there trying to pass themselves off as locals.

lanod2407

Muckit - I agree with you. We're living in tough times, and price is king. Makes is more important than ever that our home-produced fare is priced to sell on its merits and not just because of its origin.

Caroline N - great point on Love Irish Food logo, though I hear it's quite expensive to buy the right to use it. They do seem to have a strict code that makes it credible.
I did question Barry's Tea using it - where are the tea fields in Cork??? (Tea fields ..... Lee Fields??!!) But a friend pointed out that all of the processing, blending, packing, etc. happens in Ireland. That'd appear to be OK - especially when you consider that Lyons Tea have moved their processing and packing offshore.

Guaranteed Irish is laughable - I may be wrong but I understand that the requirement is that more than 50% of the VALUE-ADD content is spent in Ireland ...... so what does that mean .............. half the milk carton comes from Ireland so the milk is Guaranteed Irish??!!

blue5000

Just had a look at some centra ham slices, has a bord bia label on the front, turned it over and in tiny font has 'specially produced in Ireland for centra' then it has a Cork address, then a BELFAST HARBOUR ESTATE ADDRESS. Wonder where the pigs came from?

pearliewhite

Couldn't agree more! Really annoys me.....especially when they try to mislead you with Irish sounding names and green packaging with pictures of farms on them etc! You need an extra half an hour shopping to sieve through all the fake Irish produced stuff in order to actually try to buy Irish!!

r3nu4l

Caroline N wrote: »

If you want to know what's really made in Ireland, check out the Love Irish Food website - they've very strict rules of what brands can have their logo. http://www.loveirishfood.ie

lanod2407 wrote: »

Just had a look in the fridge .......... Avonmore Sour Cream ...... UK.

Interestingly the loveirishfoods website lists Avonmore FRESH cream as Irish so it looks like you really have to look at each individual product. So rather than saying 'Avonmore is Irish', or even 'Avonmore Cream' is Irish you have to go to each individual product to check if it's Irish.

Link

CJhaughey

Some of the stuff is made in the North, so it has UK certification.
Its still made on the Island of Ireland though.
Are you looking for a Republic of Ireland sticker?
What if it was produced in Belfast from pigs farmed in Cavan, Monaghan or Donegal then re-exported here?
On Charleville cheese, the cheese is Irish but it is packed in the UK, therefore it has the UK mark.

Plazaman

There is some loophole that if it's packaged in Ireland it can be branded as Irish so for example we could get all ingredients from UK for a biscuit that is manufactured in the UK but if the ship the product in bulk to an Irish packaging company is can be classed as Irish (I'm sure I heard Conor Pope going on about this).

The fact that for the last decade farmers were getting EU money for set aside land (i.e. do nothing money) and REPS and all the other crap, the majority of land (no built on with ghost estates) is not being used for crops as it was back in late 70's early 80's. To get out of our dependancy on EU, is it not time to go back to this? I would also discourage farmers selling to the big chains and set up their own Farmers Markets so that the profits go to them and us consumers still get the food cheaper rather than paying middlemen.

Corsendonk

Caroline N wrote: »

If you want to know what's really made in Ireland, check out the Love Irish Food website - they've very strict rules of what brands can have their logo. http://www.loveirishfood.ie

Yes rule number one pay us your money first to use are brand!

49801

board bia origin ireland is the only label that can be trusted

any other irish branding just means there is value added in ireland... packaging etc.

Corsendonk

whelan1 wrote: »

wasnt there something about denny too?

Galtee, during the dioxins scandel it came to light that the Galtee Irish breakfast was actually Dutch/Danish.

Corsendonk

49801 wrote: »

board bia origin ireland is the only label that can be trusted

any other irish branding just means there is value added in ireland... packaging etc.

Not really, the chicken label still confuses and it a quality scheme not a country of origin scheme. So we have Tesco selling Bord Bia approved chicken with the Bord Bia symbol minus the tricolour because NI farms have passed the quality scheme. Technically I could get a Bord Bia Quality Scheme mark if I had a chicken farm in Brazil.

lanod2407

r3nu4l wrote: »

Interestingly the loveirishfoods website lists Avonmore FRESH cream as Irish so it looks like you really have to look at each individual product. So rather than saying 'Avonmore is Irish', or even 'Avonmore Cream' is Irish you have to go to each individual product to check if it's Irish.

Link

Same with Cadbury's - the 8 chunk plain milk chocolate bar carries the Love Irish Food logo, but I can't find another Cadbury's bar that carries it ....... would I be too cynical to think that they produce one bar here so that Cadbury's get their name on the Love Irish Food platform --- the 'halo effect' I believe its called??!!

lanod2407

CJhaughey wrote: »

Some of the stuff is made in the North, so it has UK certification.
Its still made on the Island of Ireland though.
Are you looking for a Republic of Ireland sticker?
What if it was produced in Belfast from pigs farmed in Cavan, Monaghan or Donegal then re-exported here?
On Charleville cheese, the cheese is Irish but it is packed in the UK, therefore it has the UK mark.

CJ, I'm struggling with your Charleville cheese input - how can it be viable from a cost perspective to make cheese in Cork and ship it to the UK to be packed, and then ship it back here?
Sorry - but I'm just not buying that one - both literally and metaphorically!!

Corsendonk

lanod2407 wrote: »

Same with Cadbury's - the 8 chunk plain milk chocolate bar carries the Love Irish Food logo, but I can't find another Cadbury's bar that carries it ....... would I be too cynical to think that they produce one bar here so that Cadbury's get their name on the Love Irish Food platform --- the 'halo effect' I believe its called??!!

I think they still make the bars in Dublin, use to show you on their website.

Corsendonk

lanod2407 wrote: »

CJ, I'm struggling with your Charleville cheese input - how can it be viable from a cost perspective to make cheese in Cork and ship it to the UK to be packed, and then ship it back here?
Sorry - but I'm just not buying that one - both literally and metaphorically!!

Jay Raynor C4 food programme carried this story because the British had a problem with it too. Something like 40% of chedder sold in the UK comes from Ireland. They ship it over in the large blocks to Leek in Staffordshire. The Kerry group have a huge chesse cutting and grating plant their, the blocks get cut and gratted. Relabelled as UK and sold to the major UK food retailers so are we fooling the UK consumer?

Other dairy companies send their cheese products to be processed there too on contract. I should say that the EU is currently changing food labelling so say for example a ready meal it would tell you the country of origin of the major ingredients in the ingriedients list.

CJhaughey

lanod2407 wrote: »

CJ, I'm struggling with your Charleville cheese input - how can it be viable from a cost perspective to make cheese in Cork and ship it to the UK to be packed, and then ship it back here?
Sorry - but I'm just not buying that one - both literally and metaphorically!!

You don't have to believe me, I have no interest in cheese at all.
Thats one of the mysteries of modern commerce why practices like this occur but big food groups didn't get to where they are by being stupid in business.
You have to understand that maybe <5% of the cheese shipped to the UK is shipped back here, maybe the other 95% is sold in the UK? That would explain a lot, and shipping back would be part of the return of the trailers that shipped the cheese over in the first place.

49801

Corsendonk wrote: »

Not really, the chicken label still confuses and it a quality scheme not a country of origin scheme. So we have Tesco selling Bord Bia approved chicken with the Bord Bia symbol minus the tricolour because NI farms have passed the quality scheme. Technically I could get a Bord Bia Quality Scheme mark if I had a chicken farm in Brazil.

but you could not get the tricolour or the 'origin ireland' with is a significant part of that label. Just my opinion.

r3nu4l

lanod2407 wrote: »

CJ, I'm struggling with your Charleville cheese input - how can it be viable from a cost perspective to make cheese in Cork and ship it to the UK to be packed, and then ship it back here?
Sorry - but I'm just not buying that one - both literally and metaphorically!!

On the subject of cheese, I make a point of buying Irish 'cheddar' from UK stores and it mostly has the tricolour of the Republic on it so people know it's Irish, it's also labelled 'Irish'.

As for the cost-benefit of producing something in one country, shipping it elsewhere to be packed and then shipping it back, it's mad but very true.

I can buy East Anglian potatoes in East Anglia and congratulate myself on buying 'local' food that hasn't travelled too many miles (the 'green' agenda). The reality is that they are grown and harvested in East Anglia, sent to the North of England by truck for packaging and then shipped back to East Anglia to be sold.

This is to do with economies of scale and public perception.

Example. If I have one potato packaging plant in the North of England I can employ 20 people to run that packaging factory. If I contract a haulier to take potatoes from East Anglia, the Home Counties, The West Midlands, Yorkshire etc and pay him to bring all of those potatoes to a central depot for packaging then the cost of that is far cheaper than me opening 8 local factories around the country:

8 land purchases,
8 buildings,
8 lots of packaging equipment
perhaps 5 employees in 8 buildings (40 employees, twice as many as before)
Still need a haulier collecting from farms and bringing to each factory...

All of that cost will amount to more than bringing them all to one place and packing them there before shipping them back.

The same goes for flying them to another country (within reason)!!

The advantage of course in labelling the potatoes as 'East Anglian' Home Counties' etc is then obvious as it eases the consciences of those who think they are being 'green' by buying 'local'. Nearly all companies out there are not just being misleading about the origins of their products but also about how environmentally friendly their processes are. Same goes for the health claims...last night I ate something that told me there were 'no artificial colours or preservatives' Woo hoo, must be good for me, right? Nope, 60% sugar, on the fast-track to diabetes and heart attack world if I eat too much of that

littlesthobo

lanod2407 wrote: »

Same with Cadbury's - the 8 chunk plain milk chocolate bar carries the Love Irish Food logo, but I can't find another Cadbury's bar that carries it ....... would I be too cynical to think that they produce one bar here so that Cadbury's get their name on the Love Irish Food platform --- the 'halo effect' I believe its called??!!

Some Cadbury products are made in Ireland and some in the UK which would probably explain this.

This has been going on for ages. I checked some cheese labels ages back and i found Charleville aren't the only ones with the UK stamp, Wexford farmers Cheese & Low Low Cheese were UK stamped and Avonmore Cheddar was stamped BE. I have been told before that the reason for this is because they are packaged there.

Dubliner and Kilmeaden were the only ones from what i checked with the IE stamp.

Also I once purchased Kerrygold butter from a shop in Nenagh with UK marked on it. First and only time it happened.

What really irritates me is how own branded products don't list where they are made, only info on them is usually "specially made for" Centra or Dunnes or whoever the case may be. The customer should know where the product has come from.

Corsendonk

49801 wrote: »

but you could not get the tricolour or the 'origin ireland' with is a significant part of that label. Just my opinion.

True but people just see the Bord Bia at the top of the label and assume NI chicken is ROI.

Corsendonk

49801 wrote: »

but you could not get the tricolour or the 'origin ireland' with is a significant part of that label. Just my opinion.

Most People just scan labels and see Bord Bia so it must be ROI! Just looking at the Tesco Newspaper Add in the paper now. They have some items such as mushrooms with "buy me I am irish" and a tricolour bunched together with other veg such as broccoli which is spanish this time of year. But some customers will assume that group of veg is all ROI. Then they have Wilsons Potatoes with a "Buy me I am Irish" without the tricolour as Wilsons are a NI supplier. The confusion of the consumers isnt helped by Retailers like Tesco. Like who goes out of there way to support NI farmers so why label them as Irish?

There is a EU origin system were you can basically trademark regional food, or define the process. Only 4 products do so far while other countries are way head. Richard Corrigan was looking to add more on to the list recently.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=68760687

Bitten & Hisses

Corsendonk wrote: »

Jay Raynor C4 food programme carried this story because the British had a problem with it too. Something like 40% of chedder sold in the UK comes from Ireland. They ship it over in the large blocks to Leek in Staffordshire. The Kerry group have a huge chesse cutting and grating plant their, the blocks get cut and gratted. Relabelled as UK and sold to the major UK food retailers so are we fooling the UK consumer?

Other dairy companies send their cheese products to be processed there too on contract. I should say that the EU is currently changing food labelling so say for example a ready meal it would tell you the country of origin of the major ingredients in the ingriedients list.

The factory in Leek is actually owned by the Irish Dairy Board, under the Kerrygold brand. An awful lot of cheese sold in Ireland is actually packed over there and re-imported. An example of this is Kerrygold cheese which has only recently been introduced to the Irish market. Charleville and Low-Low cheeses are indeed packed by Kerry Group in the UK, but it's actually in Northern Ireland and the cheese itself is of Irish origin. If you look at a pack of Kraft Cracker Barrel cheese, you'll see "Produced in Ireland, Packed in Belgium" which again is actually what happens. It sounds mad, but it makes commercial sense.
Plus, Kerrygold butter packed and sold by the Irish Dairy Board is Irish, but they have packaging facilities in Germany and elsewhere. Only the Irish retail packs are packed in Ireland and that's done by the supplying co-op.

powerfarmer

Worked in the dairy industry myself a few years ago you'd be amazed at the movement of product and raw material that goes on and who makes the various products and where. On most dairy products you will see a small oval on the packaging with something like " IRL 10xx EEC" on it this indicates the manufacturing or packing site where the product was last packed or processed. Just google "MILK AND DAIRY ESTABLISHMENTS APPROVED UNDER THE HYGIENE REGULATIONS" on the dept of agriculture website. You can identify the plant from the number by looking at the list.

Re the charleville cheese, as far as I know the cheddar is not made in charleville, only processed cheese , easysingles, cheese spread , cheesestrings are now made in charleville. Some of the former mitchelstown brands galtee,calvita are now made in charleville too.
As previously said most irish chedddar is packed in leek staffordshire, but some irish manufacturers retain theur own packing facilities notably carbery (dubliner) and newmarket (now owned by kerry)
Also HB icecream most of it is imported now too Lakeland dairies in cavan used to make it for them under contract until march 2010

tallaghtfornia

Also HB icecream most of it is imported now too Lakeland dairies in cavan used to make it for them under contract until march 2010

I noticed HB Hazel Brook Farm tastes rubbish since they stopped making it in Cavan, I also note HB never updated there website to reflect the fact that the Ice cream is no longer Irish :mad:

Also notice there new re branded Ice Cream (Blue Top) now states 'Made with Fresh Milk' And no longer states 'Made with fresh Irish Milk' and the IE stamp is gone that they always displayed when they manufactured Hazel Brook Farm in Cavan they have not replaced it with the new EU stamp (Probably to hide the fact the Ice Cream is no longer Irish)

The only thing Unileaver manufacture in Ireland is Lipton Tea concentrate in cork.

tallaghtfornia

Charleville cheese is processed in the republic and cut by Golden Cow Dairies Craigavon for both grated and cut..

bamboozle

i've found myself spending lots more time in supermarkets recently looking at the labelling of dairy products, think it was galtee cheese that had BE on its label, stricter labelling laws need to come in to ensure these products which are not fully made in ireland cannot use any form of 'Irishness' on their labelling.

on a somewhat related matter http://www.eatonlyirish.com/ some people are trying to do an eat only irish goods week this week, interesting idea and website and worth a look.

for what its worth, i recently came across Donegal Rapeseed oil and am using this in my cooking from now on instead of imported olive oils.

http://www.donegalrapeseedoilco.com/Dublin.htm

monkeynuz

Just thought I would add my little bit to this, don't know if it has already been mentioned, but honey is my real bugbear.

Boyne valley honey.......E.U. and China!

there are many others all made to look nice and diddly do with pictures of fileds and heather and little bees flapping around....but then oon the label it says product of more than one eu country or non eu country!

I have probably just written a load of rubbish but hell there you go.

M.

Geuze

I did a quick experiment in Tesco last night.

I checked several packs of ham.

Denny
Roscrea
Galtee
Shaws

All were processed / packed (?) in plant no 501, which is:

501

Duffy Meats Ltd

Shillelagh

Wicklow

All are Kerry Group brands.

All have different addresses on the back, e.g.

Shaws, Consumer Services, Limerick
etc., etc.

but these are just marketing addresses.

The consumer thinks there is choice, but all 4 brands are made by Kerry in one plant in Wicklow.

telekon

Just to clarify a few things, Charleville Cheese is made in Newmarket, Co. Cork and packed in Northern Ireland.

Muckit

Geuze wrote: »

Denny
Roscrea
Galtee
Shaws

501

Duffy Meats Ltd

Shillelagh

Wicklow

All are Kerry Group brands.

I don't any of these any more. When you taste some of the smaller producers stuff you won't go back.

Prue and Simons are my latest favorite when I fancy a 'fry up'. It's not very often I might add:D They do a lovely breakfast pack. Black and white pudding, sausages and rashers. They have a promotion on at the moment. Seen them in Athlone Ag show and tullamore show, where you got 2 packs for a tenner - and so I did! The pudding is smelt in the mouth, not like some mentioned above that turn into tyres if you not careful

Kovu

This is the exact reason I buy from a greengrocer and a butcher in my town. It is the only way when you have no time ot check history. May be more expensive, but in the long run it's better for our economy.

Bizzum

Muckit wrote: »

The pudding is smelt in the mouth

A bit too fishy for my liking:D


Spot on about the smaller producers.

lanod2407

telekon wrote: »

Just to clarify a few things, Charleville Cheese is made in Newmarket, Co. Cork and packed in Northern Ireland.

Sorry - I'm not getting that ............. if the product is produced in Cork then why does the circle on the back contain "UK" markings?
I had understood that the country designation on the back of the pack tells the consumer WHERE the product was PRODUCED, not packed??

If you can produce something in Ireland and then put UK on the pack cos its packed in the UK then we're all in huge trouble ............... that would allow Thailand chicken to be labelled IE if its packed in Ireland???

telekon

lanod2407 wrote: »

Sorry - I'm not getting that ............. if the product is produced in Cork then why does the circle on the back contain "UK" markings?
I had understood that the country designation on the back of the pack tells the consumer WHERE the product was PRODUCED, not packed??

If you can produce something in Ireland and then put UK on the pack cos its packed in the UK then we're all in huge trouble ............... that would allow Thailand chicken to be labelled IE if its packed in Ireland???

Dont get it either bud...just stating the facts is all. I wonder how many Irish consumers have put the charleville cheese back on the shelf after seeing the UK stamp?? They should really sort this by packing the stuff back south. How more expensive could it be?