Salty News: Issue 5 Summer 2024

Birthday Offer! Subscribers and Locals only.

This summer we celebrate our 3rd birthday. What a journey it has been. This time last year we were being lashed with cyclones and pretty nasty weather right the way through to September. This summer we have some excellent salt making weather and production is on track for a great harvest. Below are some of our salty highlights of 2023 but most importantly we want to say thank you for your support. To celebrate we are offering 20% off everything on our website until February 15th. Use Voucher code: BIRTHDAY to get this great offer.

Down on the Farm

So, what’s been happening down on the salt farm. Well over the winter if you haven’t already heard/read we visited 5 other solar salt farmers across the globe. You can read about our trip here. Looking back to our first issue of Salty News nearly 2 years ago we actually mentioned some of these salt farmers, so it was a real treat to meet them in person and hang out, swap ideas and learn a bit about how they go about salt production.

Another big thing for us this year was saying goodbye to our 1974 International 454 Tractor. It been here at the beach for over 20 years and has been a trusted companion launching the boat, harvesting water and taking the kids crabbing at the far end of the beach. The tractor has gone to a good family in Ngatea for a third lease of life on a lifestyle block. Our replacement is the ex-Whitianga Coast Guard New Holland 4WD tractor. Resplendent in Coastguard blue and with lots of flashing lights…literally!

2023 saw some new and growing relationships with top restaurants and Chefs. We don’t target “hospo” directly as we don’t have the production to be spread thin across this channel. However we cherish relationships with the “creme de la creme”.[Couldn’t resist 🤣] Our sea salt is featured by NZ’s top chefs in their restaurants and we are thrilled with these new associations!

PC with Ben Bayly

Ester Restaurant - Sean Connolly/James Laird –– Internationally famous Chef Sean Conolly has 5 multi-ward winning restaurants across Australasia.

Cocoro - Makoto Tokuyama – One of only two 3 Hatted (Cuisine Food Awards) NZ restaurants.

The Green a Chefs Table – Karl Martin-Boulton – Epic micro (8 seat) restaurant taking the Waikato by Storm.

Ahi - Ben Bayly – One of NZ’s most famous TV chefs and magical multi-award winning restaurant.

The Grove – Cory Campbell the Exec Chef has made his mark on this perennial multi-award winning Michael Dearth (Master Chef – Judge) restaurant.

Camillia – Jean-Baptiste Pilou – Michelin starred French chef at award winning Zeelong tea restaurant. An oasis of food heaven in deep in the Waikato Countryside.

Stop Press! Have you seen Us?

On the PR front we were busy over the winter. You may have heard us on the radio or seen us on TV? There was a lovely feature article written about us in Nourish magazine and we were covered in the Stuff Christmas Gift guide. We also received a nice piece in the local Informer: Coromandel magazine. Even top chef and entrepreneur Simon Gault was enthusing over our products on the TV segments he did! So, we are pretty stoked at all the exposure. Lastly we are due to have another TV crew here late February for a short segment on our salt making…so watch out for more news on this.

With Simon Gault at his new deli store

New Flavours and Awards - Summer BBQ Seasoning Packs

The business won a total of 10 new gold medals at the Outstanding Food Awards and NZ Artisan Food awards. We were particularly chuffed the Rare Dry Gin Sea salt won a Gold medal and was nominated for top new product of the year from over 400 hundred entries. Similarly we were really pleased our B!tching BBQ Rub beat out the big players on the BBQ scene to win a gold medal at the NZ Artisan Food Awards. Our new BBQ Summer seasoning packs feature all three gold medal seasonings are proving very popular over the summer.

Coromandel Cure Campaign

Coromandel Cure and Chocolate Collab

We decided to throw our ourselves into the Destination Hauraki Coromandel’s new tourism campaign which has coincided with the opening of our major arterial route in and out of the Peninsula. You’ll possibly see promotional packs with “the Cure” branding on product in store in the Coromandel and special offer on our website here. You may have also seen our new collab with Whangamata Chocolatiers, Coromandel Chocolate. This is their best selling bar and we are pleased to be working with such a talented artisan. Shop Chocolate here

Coromandel Dark Chocolate with Opito Bay Natural Sea Salt

Lastly if there’s someone you know who’d like to benefit from our “Subscriber Only Deals” encourage them to subscribe. New subscribers get 10% off their first order.

Cheers

Perry and Erin