Finnebrogue Artisan wins top UK honour

The local company’s operations director, Aaron Lynn, was named plant manager of the year at the awards ceremony in Manchester.

Based in Downpatrick, County Down, Finnebrogue Artisan is one of Northern Ireland’s most innovative and successful meat processors, last year celebrating the opening of its new £25million state-of-the-art processing facility.

The family-owned company is now among the largest producers of sausages in the UK, as well as specialising in other premium meat products such as venison, burgers and Wagyu steak.

“I am delighted to win such a prestigious award,” said Aaron.

“This is the highest level of recognition someone in my position can receive in our industry, so it genuinely feels quite surreal.

“It does, however, feel remarkably unjust to accept an award as an individual for something that would be impossible to achieve without a world class team behind me.

“I have therefore put the award in the office of our operations team as it belongs to them and all of our staff as much as it does to myself,” added Aaron.

While predominantly focussing their efforts on own label products for leading supermarkets in the UK, Finnebrogue also owns a number of brands including Good Little Company, Rankin Selection sausages and Finnebrogue Artisan venison.

The Meat, Fish and Poultry Processing Awards recognise and reward excellence and innovation by processors and processing companies which are driving forward initiatives and improvements in both the home and export markets.