I regularly keep up with food trends whether they are Britain-based or more global. Part of my role is to surf the web to find the best blogs and search restaurant menus – and attend conferences when I can! I also visit stores to find out the latest product launches, especially in the fish category.

We usually end up with a list of key ingredients to experiment with our very own salmon and trout in the kitchen.

— Justine Fourny, Category & Marketing Officer

Once we have shortlisted our ideas, we start with the first draft recipe experimentation. This will involve trying out some of our existing ingredients and some new on trend ingredients in the creation of the new products. At this stage we see which ingredients work best in each recipe, these are all done with the help of the team and internal tastings.

From these internal panels we then shortlist the recipes which best fit our brief, these will then be further improved down the line until they are ready to be presented to the customer.

— Neil "Chef" Morrison, Development Chef

I tend to base our flavour profiling and ingredient selection around what is on trend. It may be a recipe seen in a book or magazine or a dish eaten in a restaurant that I take inspiration from, this will then be taken to the team for discussion and then into the kitchen and worked on until we have a dish that hits the brief.

We also work closely with our clients who may want us to work on a certain cuisine or key trending ingredient within their brief.

— Neil "Chef" Morrison, Development Chef

During the kitchen development stage, we will determine if any new ingredients need to be sourced for our conceptual recipes. This involves working with our approved supplier partners to obtain the best possible raw materials within the cost constraints. Samples are obtained and on occasions we may need to refine our recipe accordingly.

The shortlisted kitchen concepts are costed before being shown to the customer and this is continually reviewed as we work through the later stages of the product development process.

— Fiona "Fee" Stott, NPD Manager

Presentation of product ideas to our customer and obtaining their feedback can be two-fold. Sometimes, customers will love the concept presented and no recipe changes are requested. However, if they want to see changes, this can mean that several reworks of the product need to be shown before we reach approval.

Often customers will want to present the final range of recipe ideas to a wider panel within their business and obtain a business-wide approval.

Once formal approval or ‘sign off’ is given, then we will progress to the more complex factory & process stages of the product development cycle.

— Fiona "Fee" Stott, NPD Manager