Maker Spotlight: Dauntsey Preserves

Dauntsey Preserves creates deliciously handmade preserves, preferring produce from their garden, the village community and local growers. They’ve picked up 46 awards in under 18 months, so we wanted to know how they did it.

We visited founder Claire Mellor-Hill and trade manager Max Mellor to ask why they began the business four years ago, and how it’s grown from a single jar of jam to a beautiful brand available in fifty farm shops and across a host of farmers' markets and food festivals each year. 

How did Dauntsey Preserves get started? 

Claire: I’m in my early sixties yet feel forty-four. I’ve worked in public relations for hi-tech companies for over 30 years based in London. Five years ago, I moved to Dauntsey, near Malmesbury, with my husband, with plans to calm down, but commute and carry on. Then Covid hit us all in March 2020: Lockdown. 

Within months of ‘staying at home’, fruits and vegetables began appearing in the established little garden, way too much for us to eat. So, I started with a recipe book and a single jar of jam. How difficult could this be? I would like to say the idea blossomed. My family would say it ballooned out of control, where nothing but the microwave in our home kitchen was accessible due to boiling pots of fresh fruit and veg and after a while – too much for us to eat, once more.

It was politely suggested I give the jam away … or that I even sold some. So, I started by selling it at the front gate. And then my neighbours encouraged me to approach the village shop and try the local market. And then the local market encouraged me to try other events. The new enterprise grew jar by jar, by opportunity and conversation, rather than thanks to any big business plan, and in many ways, that’s the lovely organic thing about it. 

I was evicted from the kitchen by family and moved into a long, low barn in the garden which had become a storage dumping area. I bought and built a B&Q flatpack kitchen with four hobs and two cheap ovens working into the early hours of the morning. Then the electrics blew.

Fast-forward from the cheapest van we could find on AutoTrader, to a (nearly) new one, and upgrading the ovens and fridges, we now have a fully formed commercial stainless steel kitchen (none of which came with any instructions or manuals) and were recently granted 5 Star hygiene status by Wiltshire Council. They gave great advice and have helped us succeed. And then my son came back from university with a degree in business and was at a loose end before joining London corporate land.

Max: I got into Dauntsey Preserves because in any family where there are people making things, you just get roped into it. So even when I was working in London, I did my duties – manning a market stall, cooking the Christmas chutney, labelling jars and helping my mum (who I call ‘Claire’ in working hours) with the orders. When the time came for the business to hire its first full-time person, I had just come to the end of a finance role in the City, so I decided to roll up my sleeves, jump in and get involved. 

Claire: And we make a great team! I was so unbelievably grateful for Max’s support – especially because he knew all the good bits but also all the tough bits, like getting up at 6am on a Sunday to drive two hours and do a market in the pouring rain. 

Markets are a big part of what you do – which ones do you normally attend? 

Claire: We have a family connection to Chiswick, so once a month we go to the Chiswick Cheese Market. It’s extraordinary, we sell more jam and marmalade than we do chutney there. London has a very cosmopolitan audience – in lots of places across the world, people eat jam or marmalade with their cheese instead of chutney.

Max: We’re often at the Frome Independent Market, and we’re generally quite committed to events in and around Wiltshire especially but also, Somerset, Devon, Dorset and Gloucestershire. We’ll be at Bath Christmas Market again, and attending most of the EAT Festivals which tour the South West. If you want to see where we’ll be next, there’s always a big list on our website. 

Claire: We’re often at different markets and events to support our local retailers nearby, so we’re always channelling people to those farm shops that stock us, and we’re constantly on the lookout for new stockists. It’s important for us to feedback from customers, too, and markets are fantastic for that. We run tastings at every event – we might have 40 different flavours to try, and you’ll occasionally get someone who wants to taste all of them! 

We’re trying to build the brand and pick up as many events as we can locally in Wiltshire, but Wiltshire is so huge and so spread out, we hop across the borders and to other neighbouring counties as well.

You’ve recently picked up a couple of new awards – congratulations! How important are awards to you?

Claire: We started entering award schemes a little bit sheepishly, just to get some feedback, because the judges do give you really good feedback. Honestly, we’ve been blown away by the responses we’ve had. 

Max: We’ve just got our 46th award in 18 months – we started entering them in January 2024. We’ve earned lots of golds and silvers, we’ve got Great Taste award-winning products, and we’ve just won two awards as part of Taste of the West and been voted Supreme Champion at the Cheese Board Awards. We also picked up four awards at the World Marmalade Championships which is super competitive.

Claire: We’re not necessarily chasing the awards, but we feel that having them means that people know we’re a company committed to quality, committed to ‘make local’ and it further sets us apart from what’s on the supermarket shelves, where it’s the same stuff no matter where you are in the country. 

Max: Supermarkets are not where we want to be – we want to be in farm shops, delicatessens, and places where they really curate their products and support local artisans. 

What produce do you use in your preserves? 

Max: It’s not all homegrown, because it can’t be, but we do use a lot of our own produce that we grow in the garden and our neighbours are incredibly generous – at a certain time of year, we’ll literally find suitcases full of quinces on the doorstep.

Claire: We went to Brinkworth Dairy earlier today to collect 60 kilos of damsons from them, and I’ve got a friend who’s got a damson orchard in a neighbouring village, so we’ll be getting some more from her as well. We know we’re going to be deluged with Bramley apples, crab apples and quinces because it’s been the most amazing year for them. We’re so grateful that our neighbours can give us their excess, stopping that food from going to waste. We offer some jars in exchange, and we also make donations to our local schools and some local charities.

Of course, we can’t get lemons, oranges, mangoes locally, so when we do have to buy in, we just buy in responsibly – we’ve got a great relationship with Bristol Fruit Market and they help us work out the best time of year to buy supplies.

Max: Seasonality is really important too – we were too slow off the mark last year with the Runner Bean Chutney, and it was too late to get any more, but this year, we’re prepared! We have 200+ jars.

We’ve not seen runner bean chutney anywhere – that’s a new one! What are your most unique products? 

Claire: Probably our Chuckleberry Jam, I’d say. We buy in chuckleberries from Windmill Farm in Herefordshire, and apart from their hilarious name, it’s a really unusual and lovely fruit – it’s a cross between a gooseberry, a redcurrant and a blackcurrant. That’s just won a gold award at Taste of the West. 

Max: On the chutney side, we’ve got Jerusalem Artichoke Chutney, which is made from the roots of a certain sunflower. We use marigolds and sunflowers to draw in the insects in our vegetable garden and pollinate the rest of the plants in the garden, and then when they’re done, we make chutney from the sunflower tubers. And that chutney is a two-star winner from the Great Taste Awards! 

Claire: Another one that’s quite unique is our Real Ale Chutney, which uses local plums and Wiltshire Gold ale from Arkells – so that’s a real taste of our county. 

Is there one preserve or chutney you like making more than others?

Claire: I love making marmalade – probably because I enjoy eating it as well! The marmalades and jams make the kitchen smell delightful. 

Max: I have many favourites, mostly chutney. I often take over on the Sweet Chilli Jam because that can get quite intense, and I love the smells and the heat. 

What’s next for Dauntsey?

Claire: We’re growing into our rebrand, which happened earlier this year with the help of a local design agency, so we’ve nearly swapped over all of the labels now. I think our next frontier is looking for more stockists and begin building a stronger online presence. We’re looking for retailers, particularly those we can include on our regular rounds for hand delivery.

Max: The other thing is we’re planning for Christmas already, so we’re doing a huge amount of cooking right now to get everything ready. 

What does being part of the Wiltshire Marque mean to you?

Claire: We’re all about supporting our community – so we donate to local schools, support local charities, and always want to work with likeminded local businesses. If you take that a bit wider, then being part of the Wiltshire Marque is being part of that wider regional community. It’s so important to reflect the wonderful county we live in and the talent that is all around us. 

We work closely with a fellow Wiltshire Marque business, Brinkworth Dairy, as they’re only a mile or so away – we both won awards at the International Dairy Awards, so you’ve got two champion makers right next to each other, and it would be silly not to support one another. 

Max: Being part of the Wiltshire Marque means we’re part of this club of fantastic quality makers and growers – it means we’ve got a great network, and a sense of real togetherness. So we love it, and we’re really proud to be part of it. 

To purchase and find out more about Dauntsey’s fantastic range of preserves, chutneys and marmalades, visit https://dauntsey.co.uk/
 

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