Manufacturing Leaders

From Syria to the UK: Founding an Award Winning Cheese Brand

• Mark Bracknall • Season 12 • Episode 1

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From Syria to the UK: Founding an Award-Winning Cheese Brand 🇸🇾🇬🇧🧀

In this episode, Razan Alsous shares her incredible journey from fleeing conflict in Syria to launching Yorkshire Dama Cheese,  now one of the UK’s most celebrated artisan cheese brands.

Key moments:
💷 Started the business with just £2,500 and repurposed equipment
🧀 Identified a gap in the market for fresh, locally made halloumi
🏆 Won 65+ awards — including at the World Cheese Awards
🌟 Supplies Michelin-starred restaurants and top farm shops
🎓 Balanced growth with studying food technology to strengthen the business

An inspiring story of grit, vision, and building something truly special against all odds.

Please subscribe to the channel for more content! Theo James are a Manufacturing & Engineering Recruiter based in the North East, helping Manufacturing and Engineering firms grow across the UK. Please call us on 0191 5111 298

Speaker 1:

I've seen a little head start. Hi, is everything okay? Yes, I'm fine. How are you?

Speaker 2:

I'm great, thanks, I can hear you. I can't see you just yet at all, but I can hear you.

Speaker 1:

Yes, I'm trying to figure out how to can.

Speaker 2:

It should be the bottom. You might have like a video icon. Yeah, I think we're coming. Yes, yeah, how are you? You all right?

Speaker 1:

I'm fine, thank you. I will sit and put on the headphones.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

And then you can text from there.

Speaker 2:

Sorry.

Speaker 1:

I'm doing this interview from the shop Nice as we opened a new shop in Bradford Darlies Street Market.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. Yeah, I saw that LinkedIn post. So, yeah, we'll definitely talk about that on the episode. So egg and stuff, all right, I'll wait until you're ready, just let us know.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I'll try to connect from the laptop instead.

Speaker 2:

Okay, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no problems. Maybe it would be a lot better.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I'll wait for you, Just no rush.

Speaker 1:

Let me know when you're ready. Alright, thank you.

Speaker 2:

See you soon.

Speaker 1:

Just a second. Yeah, thank you you.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I'm just trying to is it's um ah, do you want me to try? Are you trying? Have you tried on your laptop, have you?

Speaker 1:

yeah, but you know what if you want, if it's clear from here, I can continue from here.

Speaker 2:

Seems okay. Yeah, yes, it seems fine. Okay, let's not bother yeah. Is it? Am I coming through? Okay, your end. Am I clear enough there?

Speaker 1:

I'm, I can hear you, everything is very good with me.

Speaker 2:

Excellent, good stuff. Well, thank you very much. I'm I I'm really looking forward to this. I've got our notes in front of me. I mean, they are just notes. If you like, I'll refer to them and I'll probably look down every now and again, but we'll just have a chat through and then see what comes up as well, if that's okay. Apart from what we spoke about, is there anything else that's cropped up? We'll definitely talk about the shop. Is there anything else that you want me to sort of talk to you about or segue you into? Just so, since we last spoke, anything happened?

Speaker 1:

Well, I think what happened is just opening the shop, getting this opportunity to retail our product, which is a great opportunity actually, Especially in this time when the economy is not really great. So the big thing thing actually is just to fight and to keep the resilience there and trying our best actually.

Speaker 2:

I love it. I think it's great timing and I like the fact that you're in the shop. So we'll talk about that. That sounds perfect. What I tend to do now, reza, I tend to I record the introduction at the end, like when you've gone. So I tend to go into this straight away and then when I put it together, obviously it'll make sense. Just so I don't say it wrong. Is it Razan Alzus? Is that? How do you?

Speaker 1:

pronounce it. Yes, that's correct, yeah.

Speaker 2:

And it's Yorkshire Dama cheese.

Speaker 1:

Yorkshire Dama cheese is the company name. Yes, Excellent.

Speaker 2:

Well, if you're ready, Razan, I'll just go straight into it, if that's okay.

Speaker 1:

I'm ready, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Excellent. A massive warm welcome today to Razan Alzoos, the founder of Yorkshire Dharma Cheese, who is currently sitting in a brand new shop, which I'm looking forward to talking to her about. But welcome, Razan. How are you?

Speaker 1:

I'm fine, thank you. How are you, Mark?

Speaker 2:

Razan, how are you? I'm fine, thank you. How are you, mark? I'm excellent, I'm really good, thank you. So, um, I can't wait to get into your journey, because it is truly inspirational. Before we do that, I I ask everyone the same question when they come on this podcast, um, which is what does it mean to you to be a leader, would you say?

Speaker 1:

uh, it's, it's give me a lot of responsibility, to be honest, because you feel you are not allowed to to show uh, tiredness or weakness while, uh, from depth, you are well, you are really, really exhausted, but you need to keep always cheering up because you are leading by example and even we are all human. But when you are a leader, you can't show that you are running into very hard or tough time, but you need to keep it always up, trying to find solutions. So, yeah, it's not an easy thing. A lot of responsibilities yeah, I completely agree.

Speaker 2:

I think that word comes up a lot, that responsibility, because it is, and I think that with responsibility, because it's a real privilege and honor. But, like you say, there's also some some real challenges to that, because you have to be the one that picks up the pieces and and organizes the troops and, like you say, often puts on that brave face where some days, just like everyone else, you don't feel like putting one on, do you? That's the challenge. So I want to, um, I really want to talk about your, your journey, because I think it's inspiration, I think it's a story, if you don't mind telling that you know people would would be inspired by. So could we go back to pre pre-uk in terms of you know where you came from, where you started, and sort of what was the what led you to being where you are today, rather than, if that's okay, sure, basically, I'm originally from Syria and, uh, I grown there.

Speaker 1:

I was. I did some work before and I was doing mainly like studying because I finished my degree in laboratory science over there. Then, after marriage, I loved the domain where my husband is working. He's mainly supplying quality control equipment for pharma and dairy or pharma and food industries in Syria. Um, I loved the marketing part, the sales part of it. Then, um, I started to do pharmacology at university as well.

Speaker 1:

Uh, I'm a mother for three as well at the same time. But, um, yeah, I had a quite a stable life. I'm quite ambitious person and never rest, or, um, I wasted my time. If I had any spare time, I would spend it with the charity, supporting people. Um, I'm a foodie as well, person who loves food.

Speaker 1:

For me, food is not only about eating, but it's, I find it something to bring people together, bring happiness. I always I much enjoyed actually seeing people or watching people are enjoying the meal which I made rather than eat it myself. This is give me a lot of energy and aspiration. Maybe I'm quite an optimistic person, so I wouldn't say life is rosy, because definitely I passed through a lot of hard times, but I always worked on myself and one of the things actually actually I made it as a decision with myself that whenever I take any decision, I want to take it to a level that I never regret it. So whenever I'm making any change in my life, I'm always calculating the risk and think what could be worse things and I should accept the results. I hate to regret things.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, 100%, and that in itself, so many lessons. There. I completely agree, food is fuel, food keeps us alive, but it's so much more than that, isn't it? It connects us and if you think about all the memories that you've made, the holdings you've had and the friends you see, and and it's typically around food, it's to be around. You know that. I think that's why it has that emotional response. You know, everyone knows if you, if you eat something which you had as your childhood, it takes you the smells and a taste. So you're right back being that moment and I don't think anything, apart from maybe, music. Nothing else really does that, does it?

Speaker 1:

Yes, exactly.

Speaker 2:

Syria obviously is a very different country to the UK and obviously has its challenges, you know, which obviously are well publicised, and you know we talk a lot about resilience. We talk about resilience in a new generation, but resilience means different things, different people, and I think often you draw upon experiences. You've had good and bad, but obviously typically it's the bad experiences that you draw on the resilience, because situations where you've had to draw on it, unplanned sometimes, what was that like? You know, why did you decide to leave Syria to unplanned sometimes, what was that like? You know, why did you decide to leave Syria to the UK and what was that process like? Because I imagine that was challenging.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So basically, when I was in Syria, I was always planning for my future and, as I mentioned, I never been been like sat down, do nothing. But the thing is like we usually take life for granted. You feel like you've grown up in your family, you finish your degree, then you work, got married, have children, that's it, this is life. But actually in reality, that's not. This is what we wish, actually, even I think if life it's got this routine, maybe we'll feel bored and we feel it's boring. I I don't know, but life is about having challenges. So whoever think that, um, life without problems, uh, is a good life, that's not correct. That means you are doing nothing. Even if you are at home doing nothing, you will be in trouble because you will have a lot of mental health issues. So, basically, but the thing is, when you have something obligatory, it's not like you are managing for it.

Speaker 1:

So here were the turbulence happening usually, and this is what the war is bringing. The revolution started in Syria and the war started and things started become unsafe. However, we usually don't like, we didn't make the decision to leave straight away because we felt this is our homeland, this is our history, my husband's experience. I didn't. I wasn't working there, I was studying over there and we were dreaming of our home, making comfortable for our children, thinking about their future, and things actually start to be changed by the time. So the security became less. The essentials became less than before.

Speaker 1:

Even though you feel you are still challenging your situation, you don't leave straight away, until, actually, an explosion happened at my husband's office. This is when we thought it is the time, because safety comes first, and especially for our children. Sometimes, for yourself, you would say it's all right, I managed to survive, but when you have children, you feel that you really you are responsible on their security and their future. So we had to make this decision to leave. And then we came to the UK. We were actually one of those fortunate people that we had visas to the UK at that time because of my husband's business. He used to represent British companies in Syria. This is why we managed actually to come to the UK straight away.

Speaker 2:

Amazing and so sorry you had to go through that, and you know a lot of people listen to this, including me have kids and I think they come first. Similar to that, don't they? And when you look at, the bare minimum that we have to require is to have them in a safe place, and when that's taken away from you, I can only imagine how hard that is to do that. But, like you say, you're moving them away from your home, where you've grown up, where your family, your friends are. I think some people just presume those decisions are still quite black and white, but you know they're not, are they? Because there's so many things at play.

Speaker 1:

It's um you need to think a lot about a lot of things because, first of all, you need to think how am I going to survive over there? Um, what jobs am I going to do? So, first of all, we were always prepared at that period of time. We were always prepared with all our certifications, all qualifications. We thought the documentation to prove who we are, what we've done, are very essential, at least to have a language to talk about with others or to introduce ourselves, to find another opportunity. But mainly, we were focusing on my husband's experience, because he had 15 years of successful business in Syria in the QC labs.

Speaker 1:

But for me, actually, I was more focusing on my children and their life and their safety and not to be affected by this decision. But you know when things we say, um again, you wish something and you plan something, but you end up doing something else. So when we arrived to the uk, uh, I granted the as the uh settlement with my children for after a month, but it took it took my husband around two years to be able to have his residency. And here, where we had, uh, we've been shocked actually. And uh, the unexpected happens as I had the work permission, because maybe people think what the difference? So if you don't have settlement, so you are not allowed to work, you need just to sit down and wait and um, so at that time I'm the one who got the work permission and he's not, so we planned to rely on him and now he he can't help us. So this is what made me, uh, to think in different direction. And here where I would say, flexibility in life are really essential, because you can't just keep sitting down and crying. You need to act, and act quickly, because time are running and to start to gain. You need to stop the loss. And here where I start to think I need to act, I need to do something to support my husband and my family.

Speaker 1:

Okay, first of all, I went to the job center. They said, like they've seen my qualifications, I start to make a CV, send it to apply for jobs. But no one was interested. I don't know what's wrong. I don't know how to write a good CV, or maybe lack of experience in the UK. I think this is one of the really important things in the domain that you need to have some references or experience from the UK, not only overseas. Even the advisor at that time at the job center, she told me you are more qualified than me, but I'm wondering why you are not finding anything.

Speaker 1:

I kept in this position for a year. I just managed to have some part-time interpreting. So I used to do interpreting for a company for Arabic English language. But this is not my ambition and I think I've got like. I always thought about my children and I thought, if I can do something, maybe after five years we'll be in a better position. However, at this certain of time, actually when you are in this phase, your sense would be different. You look at things from different angles and, um, you look at things from surviving, uh point of view, not a luxury or having options. And here, when I, after a year not finding a job, I made a decision to to become a self-employed yeah, amazing and I think what's obvious there.

Speaker 2:

Look, there's so many lessons in all that and I think you know, you reflect to yourself it's life is about.

Speaker 2:

Life throws things at us and it's how we deal with them, it's how we pivot and how we are flexible. And, like you say, you had that plan there as a family and you know that's a drastic change for suddenly you to be the, you know the, to be the, you know the main brand with a family and and support the children, which is amazing. You've always, obviously always had that ambition and drive and that entrepreneurial flair inside you, because a lot of you know 99 of people would have just accepted what was in front of them and probably kept in that job, you know, for, you know, forever, potentially. You didn't, you know, you decided to take the, the risk and leap into life, into self-employed, which is is the absolute unknown, um, without doubt, but obviously you backed yourself there, which is amazing. Fast forward now to um, fast forward when you started the business, um, tell, tell us a little bit about Yorkshire, dama Cheese and sort of why you decided that was the venture for you.

Speaker 1:

So, basically, when you think your qualifications are not counted, you need to start to listen to yourself. And this is really important because in life usually we just go into a route where we find ourselves. We started this route. I've been in medical domain all my life but suddenly I felt this is not going to help me and I started actually at the beginning. I tried to continue my study in pharmacology here in the UK, but it was a bit hard for me and this is the routine option. You know, the lazy option is to continue what you have stopped. So but later on, because you know I need to start from the beginning. I didn't have enough finance to finance myself.

Speaker 1:

But when I start to listen to myself, what am I good at? And I found myself straight away, I'm in foods. The first idea I thought about was about making finger food for parties, because I thought this is a good option where I don't really need to have a big investment, while I can ask always for down payment to buy the raw materials when I have an order, then make the order and get the rest of the money. So I thought this could support me at a certain point. But again, when I thought about it. Having three children, it wasn't an easy thing for me doing things from my kitchen as well. Then, suddenly, actually, I noticed that halloumi cheese is not available all year round at supermarkets, and usually you might think why halloumi is because halloumi is our tradition cheese in Syria and we usually buy it every day for breakfast. So when I didn't find it, I asked the staff why there's no halloumi. They said it's a seasonal product and it will be stocked back in May. So that was October time and that surprised me, to be honest, because I always thought the milk, like what I discovered when I came to the UK is the milk. The milk in the UK is amazing. You might not feel the same, might not feel the same feeling as mine, but because I'm coming from the Middle East where, for example, today over there in Syria it's 42 to 45 degrees Celsius, so the cows can't have a nice green grass and that's reflected on the milk, milk quality, while here in the UK this constant weather yesterday it's been raining even we are in July. The this is makes uh, the green dales is a good feed for animals. That makes them happy, happier and reflect on the quality of the milk. However, I always felt the milk in the UK. When I tasted it I felt it's something very rich and I thought, since the raw materials are available, why not to make halloumi in the UK? So I wanted at the beginning to make it for my family because I thought with the availability of this good milk I might make a good, better cheese for my family.

Speaker 1:

When I started to read how can I make halloumi Because the first thing I told my husband I'm thinking to make halloumi he said do you know how to make it? I said no, I don't know, but I will read why not? Like it's all about knowledge. So I started to learn how to make halloumi cheese and I didn't find a direct information straight away saying this is the recipe. I tried to find in Arabic or English. Then that took me into different routes. That took me into different routes where, whenever I searched for halloumi cheese, I start to, like you know, when you get this, pop, uh, use that. Um.

Speaker 1:

Tesco doubled the amount of halloumi, imported halloumi. Then you find Nando's started to have halloumi on their starter or their menu and then I thought I never thought that halloumi is a big deal in the UK. I thought it's an authentic product. Then this has made me go into more sophisticated research, where I start to understand how much UK is producing milk and how much is the waste. And are there any Haloumi makers in the UK? Then I found there are a few and they are on very small scale. They are making cheese and Haloumi is one of their products, but there aren't any speciality. And one of the information which attracted me is when I found that UK paid 35 million euro to the biggest halloumi imported in 2011.

Speaker 1:

And at that time the business idea just sparked in my head and I told my husband you know what? Why not make halloumi in the UK as a business? You know what? Why not make Halumi in the UK as a business? He said at that time he thought I'm so excited and he said I don't know how would you manage it. I said I will try, let's start it. I thought if I can guarantee 1% of the market, I will ensure I'm having a good life in the UK for myself and my family. And this is how everything started Learning and I was making some trials of making halloumi cheese and my husband tasted it and he said, just guiding me, it's far away, a close, something different. We made something. Not like halloumi at all.

Speaker 1:

However, to shortcut because the story is very long um, I applied, I went to the job center. I told my advisor this is my idea. She referred me to the enterprise agency and they helped me through the startup loan and they did um help me with mentoring, and this is I always say mentoring is really, really important because the mentor always the first person would believe in you and will give you this energy to continue. So, basically, I've done all the job, but the mentor kept motivate me and because they've been with a lot in this position before, so my mentor always told me Rezan, you would do it, you will succeed. And once I asked her how? How are you confident about it? You don't know me. She said I've been in this position with a lot of people and you can tell who wants to work and who doesn't. And this is what made me always like believe in myself and just took me out of my um like I would say like bad energy or low energy. This motivated me and this is how everything started. I applied for a loan of £2,500. Not a lot, but it does the job.

Speaker 1:

We managed to buy a very like you can call it from scrap a very old used equipment. One of them were an ice cream machine, where my husband changed it from cooling milk into warming milk and we bought a very like. We start to imagine how can we make the production line and use very old equipment not being made for this purpose? And we managed to make first halloumi. That was in June I think it was 17th of June 2014. So we came to the UK in 2012. In 2014 is the first batch when we had the approval to make halloumi cheese in the UK.

Speaker 2:

Such an incredible story and a lot of people I have on here are, um, senior people in manufacturing or people who even are managing directors within manufacturing. But it's always a key difference between people, business people and entrepreneurs and and I don't class myself as an entrepreneur I own a business. You know, I the thought of having multiple businesses north of you know, scares me. You're an entrepreneur because you see an idea of an opportunity even though you don't actually know that stage what the solution is, and you find out what that solution is and you and you go and get it and that is a real, unique and tiny percentage of population that does that. But you know, the best businesses are made from those little ideas where someone's just been often very stubborn and resilient to make sure they do it, and it doesn't work at first to do it again. They tweak it, do it again until it creates something. That's what you've done.

Speaker 2:

So I think that's an amazing thing and I imagine most people listening, exactly like you say, has halloumi as a because. Now it is huge, isn't it? I mean, if you look at all you know the the new generation I'm not new generation, I'll put myself in this we go out for breakfast as a family, most saturdays we'll normally add halloumi on as an add-on, because it's a, it's a luxury, but it's a it's a very tasty luxury. So it it's a huge, huge product and I can only see it rising and getting bigger and better. And the fact it's sourced in the UK and manufactured in the UK, I think, is amazing. So, look, it's such an inspirational journey. Small businesses are challenging there's no doubt about that and I think people purchase a product and they don't think about the journey that product has been on and the journey that business has been on to be able to make that product into what it is today. What do you think is the biggest challenge that small business owners particularly manufacturing, but just small business owners face today?

Speaker 1:

to be able to do what you do and get that end product well, um, first of all, I just want to, uh, go back to your word. The entrepreneurs are different than business people. That's absolutely correct. And, um, the thing is, when you start as entrepreneur, the first people would say you are crazy are the business people. But later on, the entrepreneurs can't grow really well without the business people because each one got different position and different speciality.

Speaker 1:

And first of all, I think in small business challenge is that you need to be both of them. You need to be the entrepreneur and you need to be the business person, because you can't grow your business with only dream and vision. You need really to count each small things and you need to think how you make it sustainable, how to increase the efficiency, how to solve your problems, how to take the risk, because the entrepreneurial part will make you run, but the business part will make you run and think more in risk calculation. So this is really really hard for small businesses because it's challenging. It's not an easy thing to make the balance between both of them. I would say in small business, this is the organic stage when we usually you need to do different jobs. You need to be in the consumer's head like or place. You need to, to play different roles. You need to be the director, but you need to be the producer. And one of the hardest things when you are tired, you can't make right decisions. When you feel, uh, your business going down, you need to make a survive, to press on the surviving button and say, well, we need an emergency in here. We need to work it in different way. But again, when you are small, no one will believe in you. This is one of the hardest things. So you can't access, uh, funding easier. Uh, you can't, um, uh like, highlight or deliver the message you want in the right way. You will do your own marketing by yourself. You won't go back to an expert, but, um, you should learn from your mistakes as well, and hopefully not to be a massive mistakes, because this could finish you at any minute. Um, being being a small business, that's mean you won't have advisors, you won't have the experience. This is where you really need to put yourself in the right environment and don't scare.

Speaker 1:

From top to big people and I've been always privileged in. I don't know if this is the case in all industries, but their industry specifically is a very lovely. There's a very lovely atmosphere where people are helping each other and supporting each other. I've sat with managing directors for companies with 95 million pounds turnover and they've been very supportive and very proud of what I'm doing. This is, by its own is amazing because you feel you. I've been invited to different areas. I visited lots of different factories who are making cheese and I always remember the first legend. She passed away her name, judy Belch, the legend in blue cheese making. She makes blue cheese in New York. When I met her she didn't give me really a lot, but she just supported me and this is really good to find someone who is a legend in the profession you are making, telling you go ahead, you can do it. This is what's on, it's a credit and I always felt I'm empowering myself and putting myself in the right place, meeting people. Whenever I'm down, I always go on to networking events, listening, hearing or start to find a way.

Speaker 1:

Like small businesses will have a lot of challenges in business strategy and on top of that, I think one of the massive challenges is whether you need to be or to work in one showman direction or on enterprising, on enterprising. So if you want to grow your business, you would. You can't if you will keep it as one showman direction. You would never grow bigger. You will have, at the beginning you will have better income, better fund, because you are only person who's working, but you will consume yourself. You will consume your mindset, your energy and you can't. You will put yourself like in a box. You will limit yourself from growing, while when you start to work on enterprising, that's mean you need to employ people, you need to put a system, you need to grow a policy and you need to understand different things.

Speaker 1:

For example, I always struggle to understand the employment law because it's very new for me. But I'm always trying to go to specialists Like, for example, I don't interfere in accounting Straight away. There's no way I do the accounting. I've got the I would say, the aspiration. I understand where we are, but I always went to a professional accountant. There are a few areas where you can't really risk it. And again, for employability and to understand the law and what is my right, what are the employer's rights, you need to go to a solicitor. There's no way to think you can risk it or do it by yourself, because a silly mistake or an ignorant mistake could kill the business. So it's quite challenging being a small business.

Speaker 2:

There's such good advice to surround yourself with the right people and not take everything on yourself amazing advice, I think, part of being a leader and part of growing a business of any kind, particularly a smaller business, in its you know, when you first start off, in its infancy. It's how you is. When is the time to start looking at your culture and start looking at the values? Because I think, in my opinion, the best businesses are value-led workplaces. Sometimes you get businesses where they just have values on a wall and it's never talked about, it's never discussed. Sometimes you get businesses where they're not visible but they are everywhere internally and everyone knows and you hire against it, you train for it. What are your thoughts on that value and how important is culture to you as you grow as a business?

Speaker 1:

Values are very important in business because this is the reason of your existence. Now there are a lot of people who producing products, which is, which got no value, but this is could be affected with a lot of things, for example, if the trend's been changed, if the lifestyle has been changed. So when you don't have value, you won't create a necessity. So one of the things I always thought about I'm not making an innovation, I'm making an existing product. So halloumi, it's not my innovation, but I highlighted the value of the British milk and how is that reflecting on the cheese and this is made a premium product. Even the original halloumi made, for example, from sheep's and goat's milk that's correct which got higher, like more expensive or higher value, rather than cow's milk. But I made different value. My value was mainly in appreciate the local produce, investing in what we are having in the UK. When you are receiving cheese made overseas, it would be manufactured with less quality. Quality always used to be one of the important issues, because when you make a quality product, this is what lasts. It will take longer to become very well known, but once it's there, people can't go backwards, because this is how usually our life going. You need to go further more and this is, by the time, will help to bring value to your business. Because, like initially, when we talk about the business value, it's not like it would be for a certain time about your turnover and your profit margin. But before you start to think about this need to think about the value of your branding and about what you are doing. So once you work hard on your branding, you will have a strong establishment so it will be easier to deliver it to people and scale it up further more in the future. And this is the job of the business people, the investment part of the business usually. So, basically, what I've done during now this is my 10 years in the business. Within these 10 years, always been keen about working on the product itself, develop it, having an identity to it, make it a British made, because I always believed in the British standard. So when I'm making um, it sees originally from the Middle East, but halloumi made with cow's milk is a British made. And I managed. Actually, our cheese beat a lot of other halloumis in different competitions, like the World Cheese Award. We sat side by side with bigger companies and we beat them Even on the UK. So far. We've got around 65 awards within these 10 years in the business and a lot of like. We have a good level of customers. So mainly our customers are Michelin star restaurants, very important farm shops and delis when you talk about Chatsworth House, when you talk about Fodder in Harrogate so they are really the top end places where they're keen about a quality, local produced product. So this is where we have managed actually to deliver this product and we keep like this level of it.

Speaker 1:

Now it's the time maybe, to grow it up. So during my journey I've done another thing. As I told you, I never sit down. I increased my personal qualification as well, so I really need to improve myself and change my mindset. When we started, we always thought it's our baby, we need to protect it, and this has limited our investment possibilities or how to think about investment. But during my journey I came across the apprenticeship program and I studied. This year I'm graduating from Sheffield Hallam University. I finished a food technology degree. During my study I did all my researches about my products and I start to learn how a business model and how to manage a food industry and better than before. So I'm starting to understand more the business concepts to have to be ready actually when we've got the opportunity, then we can land in the right way amazing.

Speaker 2:

That's, uh, yeah, unbelievable, and you know what you've built there is. It's very special and, as we, as we sit here today, behind you is your new shop, which I'm sure was a extremely proud moment. Was that always on the roadmap, or was that an opportunity? Uh, another one you saw and thought, let's, let's be busier no, actually.

Speaker 1:

Um, we, we always thought like you know what we're not like, because we are a small business you would like. We are using different channels for our sales. So we are doing online, we are using distributors, we do direct sales to food services. But retailing and selling to end user got a vital role because it got two things we are the ambassador of our brand and when we talk to people, they understand the value of our branding the product. When we do tasting, so you would get. It will be harder at the beginning, but you will have loyal customers, which is really great. And the second thing is the profit margin is better because this is like it's like don't put your eggs in one basket, you are distributing the rest. So this will help the business to nourish a little bit, especially in hard times. So we always thought about it but we didn't know where to start because, again, one of the hardest thing for small businesses is the cash flow.

Speaker 1:

But when we had this opportunity, when we heard about the new market in uh bradford, they, they approached us. The council contacted us and they say they are looking for a cheese maker, locally produced cheese, and someone recommended us. I think this is the the result of of the good job we've done before. So it looks like we are getting back what we have spent on and they are so proud to have us in their markets and we've seen everything. It's a very nice place, very modern.

Speaker 1:

I would recommend everyone to come and visit us in Darley Street Market in Bradford and we opened this shop over there and our motto or our aim in this shop is to stock only local produced products. So less processing, more like made in the UK. We are trying I'm not like I'm a bit racist to Yorkshire. I'm stocking mainly things from Yorkshire, but I'm stocking as well different cheeses from Cumbria, from Cheshire, from down south, so a lot of areas as well. Because I believe in these businesses, I believe in what they are producing and I think this is what will make us different from supermarkets. We are small, but it's never bad to be small. We can be small now, but you never know where you would end up at the end 100%.

Speaker 2:

What an amazing place to end. This has been such an inspirational episode. Honestly, you're probably the most inspiring person I've ever met, no matter how long I've had on this podcast. So I'll find it hard to summarize, but for me, you are someone who was just born to be successful, and what I mean by that is you. Despite anything that's happened to you, you've just, you've just got on and you've you've showed how resilient, how hard working you are and you've seen opportunity in situations no one else would do. You know a lot of people would just accept their, accept their fate and accept that. You know this isn't happening, but you've kept going and you're building something. You've built something fantastic, but you're still going more and you're building shop.

Speaker 2:

And I think the lessons there for everyone as well. Which really struck for me was the importance of having the right people around you. You know, however good you are what you do, you still need the right people around you, because we can't be everything to everyone and you know we simply can't be the best at every element of the job. So make sure you either hire or work with people who are better at things that you are and that's okay. And also the mentorship piece. I think mentorship is massively underrated. I think sometimes leaders are almost scared to get mentors because they think there's a catch. You know why wouldn't they be owning the business themselves if they have to mentor? But actually some people are just made to mentor people. So so many lessons in this that I've taken for myself, and just pure inspiration. So thank you for choosing the UK to bring you and your family to and create this amazing product.

Speaker 1:

I can't wait to try it. So thank you much for that. It's been fantastic. So really appreciate it. Thank you very much, mark and um. Finally, a last thing I want to say that, um, like, life is not easy at all the time. We are having a very hard economical uh time now in the uk, but uh, I would say, never make any decision when you are tired and really try to to think. It's like a bit of pain, but you will go over it later on because you can't guarantee if anything will hurt you. You will stop doing what you are doing. It's a big problem, but instead just have a breathe and refresh your mindset and try to to to go around it. Definitely there would be think about. There is a solution, but I don't know what it is yet. By this way, you will keep the ambition, you will keep the optimism with you. So this is how we always work and hopefully it will become valid yeah, amazing.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, reza.

Speaker 1:

Amazing, we appreciate it no problem, thank you very much thanks, reza, that was amazing.

Speaker 2:

I'll just stop there, that was so good.