Sweetunda, a New Healthy Snack Dominating Retail Stores in Kenya

Burton and Bamber Company’s Sweetunda snack has seen a major sales boost over the last year following a sudden surge of consumers who are after healthy snacks.

The company that is owned by Jonathan Bamber and Ofelia Burton uses fruits to make the snacks, breaking the earlier monotony where snacks used to be biscuits, confectionery, and crisps only, yet fruit farmers with bumper harvests could add value to their products and get a share of the ripening industry.

Based in Sofia, Machakos County, the company says even though there is still stiff competition from established importers, they are optimistic as demand is shifting to healthy snacks.

According to Bamber, fruit farmers from Machakos, Embu, Murang’a, Kitui, Makueni, Meru and some parts of the Coast region no longer let their harvest rot in farms or sell it at throw-away prices to middlemen.

“Our interaction with farmers revealed that almost 70 percent of Kenyan mangoes and other seasonal fruits never make it to the market and end up rotting in the farms. We sat down with them and developed this business model, which we still employ to date,” Bamber explained.

Mr. Bamber added that they pay premium prices for high-quality fruits. The company not only buys fruits directly from farmer groups but also trains them on improved agronomy and underwrite Global Good Agricultural Practice (GAP) certification for farmer suppliers, ensuring the fruits are of international safety standards.

Ms. Burton says their main competitors are long-established suppliers from South Africa, Ghana, Mali, and South America. “However, there is still a huge untapped opportunity in the dried fruit market and that the private sector should be a catalyst in fueling growth in agriculture,” said Burton.

She added that there is a knowledge gap that can be bridged if the private sector and other partners come together. “This would greatly boost food security through value addition, as well as offering sustainable incomes to smallholder farmers,” Ms. Burton stated.

The Machakos town based company is in its growth phase and has also launched other products, including granola, orange-fleshed sweet potato snacks, and aseptic, orange-fleshed sweet potato puree, for the bakery market and food manufacturers.

This year alone, the company has processed more than 300 metric tonnes (300,000 kilos) of mangoes, bananas and other fruits and orange-fleshed sweet potatoes.

The company currently employs up to 50 workers in peak season and hopes to hire more with increased production. It was formed Six years ago, by Jonathan Bamber and Ofelia Burton who saw a gap in the healthy snacks market.

The products have found shelf space in Carrefour, Naivas, Chandarana supermarkets and independent grocers across the country.