Manufacturer Mash Direct has won the Food Manufacture Company of the Year prize at the Food Manufacture Excellence Awards (FMEAs).

The glittering award celebration was held at the Hilton on Park Lane in London on Wednesday night.

The Northern Ireland based vegetable side dishes and ready meals maker took the award having first secured the Chilled and Fresh category.

Mash Direct celebrated their success with hundreds of food and drink manufacturer guests at the Venice themed awards ceremony that was hosted by star TV presenter Carol Smilie.

Paul Wilkinson, Chairman of the FMEA independent judging panel and chair of the National Skills Academy for Food & Drink, spoke of the high quality of entries at this year’s awards.

He said: The job of selecting one company from all the category winners just gets harder every year.

In the end, Mash Direct clearly stood out as the best of the best in food and drink manufacturing due to its new product development, category management and a host of other factors.

The manufacturer shared the limelight at the award with a number of other food and drink manufacturing firms celebrating in the FMEAs 16th year.

Included in the winners at this year’s awards were: Wyke Farms, Cargill, Clipper Tea and Ginsters. The awards also featured three individual awards: the inaugural Me and My Factory Editor’s Choice Award, the Young Talent of the Year Award and the Food Manufacture Personality of the Year.

2 Sisters Food Group technical learning and development manager Janette Graham won the Food Manufacture Personality of the Year for her pioneering work in the development of the government’s new Trailblazer apprenticeship scheme for the food and drink industry.

Samworth Brothers’ Bradgate Bakery’s Wojciech Kalinowski won the Young Talent of the Year Award. Meanwhile, the Me and My Factory’s Editor’s Choice award went to Trevor Norman, operations director at Coca-Cola European Partners’ Wakefield site.

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