For many years, Farmer’s Choice has remained a household name for selling pork products such as sausages and smokies, among others, in Kenya.
The company’s roots can be traced back to 1975, which began as a small roadside butchery along Thika Road.
However, the journey to their success was not easy and required more than just luck to outshine other meat sellers.
These days, hardly will you visit any marketplace and fail to find a smokie and sausages vendor. This business has become a source of livelihood for more than 50,000 vendors and has indirectly supported the lives of over 700,000 people.
The enterprise has created job opportunities for numerous individuals and produces approximately 10 million sausages on a weekly basis.
Farmer’s Choice has grown from a small meat shop to a firm owning tracts of land and properties.
Their headquarters sits on a 10-acre piece of land, built with a slaughterhouse and processing plant. Electricity bills for refrigeration at the HQ are north of Sh. 25 million monthly.
The company has a fleet of over 150 vehicles.
They have a 33-acre farm dedicated to pig rearing and another factory, Choice Meats, on a separate piece of land. Here they manufacture beef products.
Furthermore, the company owns a 248-acre parcel of land in the Uplands. In Uasin Gishu County, they have another 30-acre piece of land for rearing and breeding pigs.
Farmer’s Choice sells its products in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania by road. They also sell to Dubai and the Middle East by air.
Farmer’s Choice Growth
The company started out in 1975, monikered East Africa Meat Products. It was owned by the family that owned the Block Group of hotels.
Currently, Industrial Promotion Services owns the pork processing firm, which acquired it in 2000. Jim Taylor has served as its CEO through the management transitions over the years.
Jim Taylor’s family have lived in Kenya since he was two. He studied at the Duke of York School, present-day Lenana High and did not pursue a university education after his A-levels.
“I was born into a very poor family,” he says.
With Sh. 13,000 from his mother, Mr Taylor flew to London and landed a sales agent position for a building & construction company. He eventually helped the company establish a presence in the Kenyan market.
In a past interview, the Farmer’s Choice CEO revealed how he was approached by one of the entrepreneurs of the Block family, Mr Tabby Block.
At the time, Jim Taylor was a prominent sales and marketing director still in his early 20s.
“I was in a shop in town as a sales director in Kaunda Street and I felt a tap on the shoulder,” he recalled.
The ensuing conversation saw Jim get poached. He made the tough decision to leave his job and company car to work for East Africa Meat Products as a sales manager.
However, he immediately regretted his decision when he arrived at his new workplace and was assigned a car infested with cockroaches as his company vehicle.
Unfortunately, it was too late for him to go back; so he had to try and give his best. Jim learned about meat processing, and in 1979, his employer decided to venture into sausage production only.
Jim recalls their first setback while trying to market their new sausages to a fast food joint on Tom Mboya Street in Nairobi.
During their pitch, the kitchen turned chaotic when the sausage they had placed on the frying pan burst open and spattered on every surface and person in the room.
Eventually, they came up with the right casing to withstand high temperatures while cooking.
“Initially, we used hog casings which are derived from a pig’s stomach, that are used elsewhere in the world. In the early ’80s, we switched to collagen casings.”
“They are much more hygienic. They are derived from beef hide and are much more economical,” said the Brit, who has been raised in Kenya since the colonial master’s era.
In 1980, East Africa Meat products adopted the now famed name Farmer’s Choice. The brand won the hearts of fast-food outlets and Kenyans following several marketing campaigns.
K&A, Jim reminisces, was the first enterprise to take in their order for sausages.
“They had 12 fish-and-chips shops in the city centre. We gradually managed to replace fish with sausages and fish-and-chips shops became sausage-and-chips shops.”
Jim was appointed as the CEO of Farmer’s Choice in 1983, making him one of Africa’s longest-serving CEOs presently. Under his leadership, the company has grown to produce over 40 different types of sausages.
Of all their products, Jim’s proudest achievement is the creation of the popular “Smokies.”
“When the smokie leaves here, it is Sh. 13 per piece. When it gets to the vendor, it’s Sh. 30. Think of the money people are making. We have seen bankers resign to take up this,” he says.
Jim jokingly reminisced about his “million-dollar idea” that turned out to be a flop.
Seeing how Kenyans loved sprinkling tomato sauce on their fast food, he imagined that selling sausages with tomato flavour would take taste buds by storm and boost sales.
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He ordered the company to import tonnes of tomato concentrate and manufacture a million “Tomato-flavored sausages”.
Despite Jim’s high hopes, his idea of selling sausages with a tomato flavour did not quite hit the mark, as people continued to buy tomato sauce sachets to pair with their chips.
“So we introduced the most beautiful Tomato-flavored sausage. I think I was the only person who liked the sausages,” he chuckled.
Mr Taylor also advised those looking to become CEOs early in their careers as he has managed.
“Try to get the company that you want to lead out of trouble,” he says.
“Try and think out of the box of innovations that would actually take them further ahead. That’s how you do it. Be recognised by your supervisors,” the long-serving CEO opined.
