Interview: Juliet Williams, co-founder of DipNation

CHANCES are this Christmas you visited friends and relations and were served up tempting dips purported to have been created by your hosts with their own fair hands, with which to coat your crudites or corn chips.

However, if you had rifled through their kitchen bins you might have discovered you were in fact eating shop-bought offerings, and may well have recognised the DipNation brand, the brainchild of Juliet Williams, husband Jeremy and Juliet’s brother Patrick Gilmour.

Produced at their kitchen in Lundin Links, Fife, where Patrick makes the dips by hand, they are perfect for the time-starved and their chunky sweet Thai chilli, roasted red pepper and spinach and feta and middle-eastern inspired houmous classics have been flying off the supermarket shelves faster than you can say triple-dip recession.

Not that difficult trading conditions have dampened our ardour for the dips, as the team found themselves busier than ever this holiday season.

“It’s quite seasonal, especially with the chunky dips, and this has been our busiest time of year as people look for something quick and easy that is a little bit different for entertaining,” says Juliet. “But they’re always popular as a Friday night treat or to take to friends to have with a bottle or two of wine.”

The business was kick-started on a trip to New Zealand in 2009 to visit Jeremy’s family, when the couple found themselves eating out at barbecues and discovering a whole new world of dips and snacks.

“Jeremy was between jobs and we spent three months out there, eating so many delicious dips and flavours, and thought why is there nothing like this in the UK? We saw a gap in the market and came back with a fully formed business plan.”

As well as a business plan, they had Juliet’s chef brother and his kitchen in a building at the family farm in Fife.

Patrick’s culinary expertise and facilities, with all the health and safety red tape already in place, was invaluable, and he makes the dips himself. Juliet and Jeremy supplied the marketing and financial know-how, having worked in those sectors in London before moving to Scotland.

“We all brought different things to the table. Jeremy has a commercial background, I know about marketing and Patrick does the production. What we lacked was sales experience, but we just threw ourselves in at the deep end and did farmers’ markets and shows. We go through kilos of stock on samples, but it seems to work.

“We have taken inspiration from southern hemisphere flavours and brought them to Europe. Our bestseller is sweet chilli flavour – we seem to have become a nation of chilli lovers – and we did roasted butternut because we thought people might like that.” says Juliet.

Initially launching in 2009 with six chunky dips, DipNation expanded its repertoire with three middle-eastern inspired houmous classics and has now added exotic Thai chunky and basil pesto options..

Already stocked in Tesco, the dips appeared in Scotmid before Christmas and they are hoping to get into other supermarkets soon.

“What makes our dips special is quality ingredients that give the best flavour. We are fresh and home-made. Our unique selling point is our thick, chunky texture, and we try to put a different slant on it, with ingredients like cashew nuts.”

Not only are the dips tasty, but Juliet is keen to emphasise their healthy aspect too. “We’re working on finding out how much of your dip you need for your five-a-day,” she says. “It’s a snack, but a healthy one and it’s a great way to get your allocation.”

With three small children, Juliet and Jeremy say they don’t exactly have a party lifestyle, but they do venture out occasionally and when they do it’s not unusual for them to find themselves eating their own dips.

“It’s a big compliment,” says Juliet. “But no-one’s ever tried to pass them off as their own – I would know straight away,” she says.

• DipNation (www.dipnation.co.uk), Tesco (www.tesco.com), some Scotmid branches, delicatessens and farm shops

Twitter: @JanetChristie2