A MALTON food manufacturer has doubled its January turnover to more than £1 million.

The Tofoo Co, which is based on the York Road Industrial Estate, said the turnover in January was over double its turnover in January 2019 and surpasses the turnover generated in the whole of 2016.

The Tofoo Co, which is run by husband and wife team David Knibbs and Lydia Smith, started as a small, family-run business four years ago and now employs more than 70 members of staff with products now sold in major supermarkets, including Waitrose, Sainsburys, Tesco and Co-op.

David said: “Our January turnover coupled with the Nielsen data released in January 2020, paints a very positive and accurate picture of the tofu category. Trends suggest that tofu is now being considered as a stand-alone ‘real food’ ingredient, not a fake-meat alternative – a great example of the growing importance of tofu to the overall meat-free category is the top two selling products in the meat-free market in January were both tofu products.

“We’re delighted that the latest four week data saw The Tofoo Co’s brand growth at 88 per cent, which highlights that more people are buying tofu than ever before.”

David added: “The Tofoo Co growth is being primarily driven by our best-selling ‘Naked’ product which has seen sales per point of distribution grow by 50 per cent - and secondly by our new product launches bringing in new users to the brand. We recognise that to expand our consumer base we must continually innovate and bring regular new products to the market but remembering that the core product has a lot of room for growth.”

Last month the Tofoo Co launched three new products to bolster consumer choice and 2020 has a number of new product launches planned.

David added: “Our aim is not to mimic or replace meat - tofu is a valuable addition to meal times and to a multitude of diets, not just those who follow meat-free or vegan lifestyles. We strongly believe that the growth and dominance of The Tofoo Co in the tofu market is testament to the superior product which has better taste and texture due to the traditional Japanese recipe using Nigari; each product is hand-made in small batches and we produce every single pack in Yorkshire.”