Dubai shoppers given a taste of Northern Ireland

Shoppers in two of Dubai's leading retailers are being given an opportunity to enjoy the flavours of tasty and innovative food from Northern Ireland.

Dozens of products from seven Northern Irish food companies are being featured in a major sampling initiative in 10 stores run by Spinney's and Waitrose.

The promotional drive, a concerted market development campaign by Invest Northern Ireland's food marketing team, is the first ever to be held in the Emirates.

The in-store tastings run from 12 to 17th March, St Patrick's Day and is likely to be the first in a series of similar marketing initiatives held outside Northern Ireland. This activity has been co oriented by the Invest NI Food Marketing team in tandem with its regional office in Dubai.

This in store promotional activity is also being supported by an extensive PR campaign in the Emirates including in store magazine profile and local media channels from radio and newspapers.

Vicky Kells, Invest NI's Director of Trade commenting on the campaign, says: "We are delighted to have gained the support from both Spinney's and Waitrose to showcase the quality, variety and originality of Northern Ireland food from such a broad cross-section of our companies to shoppers in Dubai.

"We have been experiencing record growth in sales of our food to the Emirates and Dubai in particular over the past few years. The sampling initiative is designed to raise awareness of our award winning food and its quality and availability on the shelves of the two major retailers in Dubai."

Products from the following Northern Ireland companies are being featured in this important sampling initiative.

Freeist - chocolate chip cookies, coconut cookies, choc striped peanut cookies, hazelnut cookies, milk chocolate, dark chocolate, hazelnut chocolate, white chocolate with strawberries, milk chocolate wafers, wafers.

Forest Feast- savoury doy - roasted and salted cashews, premium doy, exotic dried mango, roast and salt assorted nuts, mini doy goji berries

Grahams Bakery- viennese whirls, iced squares, chocolate chip brownies, plain filled swiss roll, chocolate swiss roll.

Linwoods- milled organic flaxseed, milled flaxseed, sunflower, pumpkin, sesame seeds and goji berries, milled flax, almonds, brazil nuts, walnuts and CoQ10, milled flax, cocoa and berries

Mash Direct- mash potato, spicy potato wedges, cheese and onion croquettes.

Sunstart Bakery- plain chocolate crunch, caramel shortcake, shortbread, raspberry golden crunch, supreme golden crunch rocky road bars

Tayto - real range, sea salt, sweet chilli, sea salt and black pepper, sea salt and malt vinegar, roast ox, ham and English mustard, jalapeno pepper, strong cheese and onion.