Launched in May, Honest Eats is an innovative online store, which aims to facilitate shopping for those with intolerances by offering an easy way to buy delicious, high quality free-from food and drink.
Lisa Costello (pictured above), a director and co-founder of the shop, told NPN about the idea behind the store. “I have a passion for food and having previously run a successful food shop in Sussex I know from experience that the demand for free-from products is strong and growing fast. However while gluten-free products like Italian pasta were very popular locally we recognized that the market is much bigger and more diverse than this. There are people with different intolerances and dietary preferences up and down the country. Launching an online shop presented the opportunity to serve everyone and offer something new.”
To save customers’ time, Costello says that Honest Eats is the only online shop that gives people the option to tailor their shopping experience according to intolerance or preference. The products are organized into categories of food types, brands and intolerances to make it easy to navigate through the website. She explains: “By selecting an intolerance or food preference from a list, shoppers can effectively eliminate all items that do not fit their requirements. So for example if a customer selected ‘gluten-free’, they would only see products that don’t contain gluten. People tell us that they love this because it saves them the time and hassle of trawling through supermarkets and reading labels.”
The largest range of products is gluten-free but the shop also offers a variety of products for many different food preferences and intolerances including the 14 top allergens, dairy-free, wheat-free, fibre-rich, low-fat, organic, vegetarian and vegan. The site includes a diverse variety of food and drink that people struggle to find in-store. There are over 600 products to choose from including many locally-produced options as well a large selection of relatively undiscovered items from across Europe.
“During the launch phase our main focus has been on the free-from market, however natural products is an important area that we are looking to grow over the coming months and years,” says Costello. “People are now more aware than ever of their health and the food that they put in to their body. Demand for organic and natural products is steadily increasing and we want to be part of that market too. Some natural items such as rice milk and a large range of GMO-free and organic products [over half the products stocked are organic] are already available through Honest Eats and we plan to expand our range as our contacts grow!
“Most of our customers are looking for gluten-free products as this is the market that is really growing at the moment and many people still struggle to find suitable alternatives in the supermarkets and high street stores,” says Costello. “But we are seeing more customers looking for other options such as dairy-free, vegan and organic food. We can definitely see our customer base growing in these areas over time.
“Our focus is very much on expanding the online shop at the moment and reaching out to a broad range of people with food intolerances and preferences. The public is starting to better recognise the legitimacy of intolerances and conditions like coeliac disease so we are also looking to develop our trade outreach over the coming months to local shops and restaurants that are waking up to the new demand.”
