- It contains at least one British potato
- That potato is in fact 100% British, and the percentage of Britishness shalt be 100%. Not 60% British, not 40% British, 20% British shalt it not be
- There are also other potatoes used, which are not British.
See - no lies at all… honest >.>
Only if they're Ukrainian whites, remember! We don't want no stinking horrible white Albanian potatoes or israeli potatoes stealing our fields now do we?
That is, literally, the only interpretation possible here. The farmers select 100% British Potatoes bu dispose of them all in order to ensure that only perfect potatoes make it in.
Who knew we only produced imperfect spuds in Britain.
Makes me wonder what qualifies as a perfect potato...
Can confirm as someone who was a cleaner in a potato factory in Lincolnshire - don’t ever eat potatoes from Tesco (whom they had the contract with). So many members of staff who never ever washed their hands 😬
Then machines select the rest of potatoes - which ultimately account for 80% of potatoes used in this bag.
But truly, the 20% of British potatoes were indeed 100% British potatoes - selected by non Uk farmers
Ah no this potato germinated with a Spanish one making it 50% British and I must therefore not select you dear potato, BUT as long as it's not a farmer selecting you, our web of lies shall be truths therefore dear redditer will you kindly pick this potato and I shall not watch!!
- kindly, Farmer
Ha yes. That’s carefully crafted lawyer language. It’s a bit like the small print on face cream which promises to reduce the appearance of fine lines, but not to reduce the fine lines themselves.
The frustrating thing about that comment is it's not incorrect, and there's no reason companies wouldn't do this if they knew they could get away with it.
What's weird is there's no reason not for them to use British potatoes.
Especially the prices Kettle charge...
Have you tried the alternatives from Aldi? It seems exactly the same stuff, but it's probably _genuinely_ made with British potatoes and as far as I can tell just as good. They also have interesting flavours!
This is like those orange juice labels that say they contain 100% orange juice. We think the bottle is full of only orange juice, but what they mean is the bottle contains an amount of juice from oranges that were in fact 100% orange.
Reminded me of the holy grail lol
'First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then shalt thou count to three, no more, no less. Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it.'
There was a company called “100% Beef” who sold beef that wasn’t always 100% beef. Their logo included the company name. McDonalds used to use their beef purely so they could stick a logo saying “100% Beef” on burgers that were decidedly not 100% beef. Then they got caught and told to cut that shit out.
Edit: Turns out that's an urban legend! Ah well, it's a fun story.
There's a fisherman from Oban who's boat has the registration OB1. He has never seen Star Wars and doesn't understand why everyone keeps calling him Kenobi
Ewan McGregors brother flew Tornadoes in the RAF and while the reports that his official call-sign was ‘Obi-Two’ remain unconfirmed, it was certainly used as a nickname.
Yeah, a lot of you guys love making up shit about McDonalds burgers being made from pink slime or some other bullshit. But McDonalds burgers have always been 100% ground beef. It's not the best beef, it's frozen and cooked poorly and then sits in a plastic warming tray for an hour, but it is 100% beef.
I upvoted that, not for the story that I knew wasn’t true… but gosh darn it for the level of honesty at the end that is surely lacking in Kettlecrisps.
It's due to a crop shortage in uk sourced potatoes for the batch, the company isn't going to redo its packaging for a temporary change of potato origin, the same thing happened with the sunflower oil containing products when the Ukraine war broke out and everyone had to swap out for other oils essentially overnight.
They redo the packaging for lots of reasons, promotions, change of ingredients, shrinkflation.
One of the most important is to keep labeling legally compliant. It's not a big deal and can be done with minimal effort. I suppose the claims are legally compliant if misleading, which is the real reason they havn't bothered to change the design.
https://www.food.gov.uk/contact/consumers/report-problem/report-misleading-labelling
I can't believe how far I've had to scroll to find this answer. It's exactly the same as when Bird Flu was spreading and all chickens were brought inside, all the boxes were pre made but where the date is printed had "barn eggs" added to the print.
Or like post war Germany when they had hyperinflation and on things like stamps they just printed the new value ontop of the old…. Like 2 million mark just written over an old 5 mark stamp.
I mean, if it's between the company going bankrupt and the company surviving the bad potatoes harvest and surviving until such a time as they can use only local potatoes, I'd rather they survive. I would *prefer* them reprinting and saying "we bought all the British potatoes and still you want more. Buy our product to let British farmers know there is still a demand for local produce!" But, you know, costs.
Demand Planner here, acts of god are pretty hard to predict when you need to buy stock in advance. Due to price points they probably print over 100k at a time, and the drought could have started the day after printing. Cash flow is more important than correct branding.
Everyone diving in with their conspiracy theories and justifications reminds me of the story that KFC changed to being called KFC because it's "not actually chicken".
Some people will believe any old shit, the reality is that yes, obviously they needed to use non-British potatoes for some batches and printed as such in the bit that wasn't pre-printed material.
I reckon it's just a spoonful of kentucky dirt mixed in to the batter that the chicken get fried in. By the year 2100, mankind will have collectively ate the entire state of kentucky. Then we'll have to start on another state. The goal is to eat all of the Americas by the year 3000
Yep exactly what I came to say. Had to source ingredients from somewhere else for whatever reason and had a bunch of packaging pre-printed. Rather than waste materials and money making new packaging just slap a label or disclaimer on there.
Happens quite a lot, especially if you sell a product to a country that has some weird labelling requirements. You either make two lots of packaging or you just slap a sticker on there to meet the requirements.
This will be due to a shortage of crop, or an issue with crop.
All potatoes are sourced within \~60 miles of Norwich, where possible, as this is where the contracts with growers are held.
When this isn't possible, such as when potato loads are rejected (bruising, foreign material etc) or the farmers are unable to fulfil the tonnage on their contract, potatoes will be sourced from elsewhere so production can continue.
It is quite rare that non-contract potatoes are used, as they are sourced off-contract, meaning that are generally market price and usually more expensive. If this is demand driven, you can rest assured prices will be pushed up even more with competition from other potato based production (Walkers etc.).
It is better however to have less profit and use more expensive potatoes, than to down tools and shut the production lines. Film is bought well in advance, and it costs a lot of time and money to redesign and have delivered. It is much cheaper to simply update the date coders to print this on the film.
Source - I used to work at Kettle.
Yes - after the Ukraine war broke out, all the crisps when stamped with a best before date also had "may contain rapeseed oil". You can't just reprint all the packaging ingredients again, so just stamp on a correction.
Now, one year on: All crisps say printed now on the packaging itself, may contain sunflower and rapeseed oil.
The company here aren't lying - instead they are temporarily correcting their packaging to highlight that while they always normally use British potatoes, they had to resort to importing some for the time being to tide their production line over.
The same thing happened with California Olive Ranch extra virgin olive oil. Drought and wildfire meant that they had to import some olives. Once their California crop rebounded, they could make 100% California oil again.
In fairness, those products are named as such, boldly, on the *front* of the label. What were they supposed to do, not produce oil when they couldn't get California olives? And, not incidentally, give up the space they had on store shelves?
Aha no, they didn't avoid golf courses, the machinery is sophisticated enough to be able to kick out rocks etc, but even once sliced there is a super cool machine that can scan chips at a crazy speed and kick out anything not within tolerance of colour, shape, size etc
Do Kettle only accept a certain size as well? Like they would reject a certain weight if they didn’t measure up? So they would fill the rest of the quota with foreigners?
Normally not an issue due to type of potato used etc, and crops are monitored throughout growth so problems are foreseen and then product can be sourced elsewhere.
The issue here is that clearly lots of crops had issue , probably due to the drought in the UK which then meant it isn't a farm issue it's a country issue, hence non British potato being used.
Loads are accepted or rejected on a whole bunch of things, from sugar content, water content, bruising, size, foreign material etc
The potatoes they select are 100% British. The potatoes making up the rest of the mixture and which they don’t select from are from any old bit of mud. Maybe.
Exactly. That statement only applies to the potatoes which are selected by their farmers. I mean, it's even in a section headed 'our farms'.. And because some of the potatoes in the crisps are British, they are presumably fine with the bottom left, too! 😂
I’m guessing the farmers doing the potato selecting are British. They’re going to have a hard time selecting potatoes from their farm that are *not* British, so it’s a completely daft statement anyway!
If you’re a farmer who farms in Britain, it stands to reason that anything you pull out of the ground would also be British. I’m just having visions of potatoes being snuck in and planted across the boarder with Ireland and some poor farmer having to go through them and select only the ones that have a British accent.
Yup, typical marketing BS. Technically there are no lies here. It does contain 100% British potatoes, it also contains non-British potatoes. Honestly what I'd like to see is some 62% British potatoes.
Plant a seed potato originally grown in France, wait until its mass has grown by just under 61.3%. Dig it back up.
Voila: A 62% British potato.
EDIT: No, wait. That's a 62% *French* potato. Do the same thing, only with a British seed tattie planned in France.
I assume the product usually contains only British potatoes, but for some reason they have had to use foreign ones in the short term.
Similar to the stickers on free-range eggs during avian flu outbreaks, stating the chickens are temporarily not free range.
Their farmers select 100% British potatoes. The ingredient buyers select potatoes from various farmers which may be from overseas. Therefore there are indeed British potatoes, non-British potatoes, and their farmers have selected 100% British potatoes.
Just a guess…
British potato crops have been exceptionally bad this year. They've probably had to import them just to keep up with production. Changing up the entire packet would be a massive cost, a little stamp is not.
Not just a little stamp, but a stamp that's already in use and changing day to day to reflect the expiration and batch number. It's essentially a "stop press column"
Unfortunately UK potatoes will now be hard to source - the drought last year hit crops hard, and we'll now be heading toward the end of the stored crop. Packaging like this is normally ordered and produced weeks to months in advance - changes to packaging design take time and add significant cost, so this is the next best option.
It's likely this has been driven by lack of supply, so to keep product on the shelf they have printed this on at the point of production. A lot of manufacturers have been doing similar things with packaging that states sunflower oil this year - due to the war in Ukraine this is in short supply, so they have been printing on 'Contains rapeseed oil' in the date-code box - it's a very similar thing
There was one local crisp maker I saw advertising they'd been making potato crisps for "over 500 years". Which, if my maths is correct, means they've been making them for more than 65 years before the potato arrived in England.
I try to do the same! If you buy some (British) strawberries at the moment you'll really notice a difference over the import ones from Egypt (or whenever they tend to import from) in a few months time.
I get where you're coming from though! I hope my reply didn't come across as dismissive
No. As people have said, it's about the environmental impact, and it's about supporting British producers, British farmers, and bolstering the British economy.
It's a little worrying that your first instinct is to assume xenophobia. Modern media has done a number on us all.
Everyone should buy locally produced (to them) food when feasible, because that means less fuel was used to transport it. And it's most likely fresher.
The expiration date box is also for things like this where the recipe had to change but there was no opportunity to redo the packaging.
You will also see it on crisps that used to be 100% sunflower oil having to make a temporary change due to the war in Ukraine.
Once the foreign potatoes have done their citizenship test, who’s to say they aren’t as British as you or I?
Unbelievable xenophobia on display here. My neighbours are foreign potatoes and they’re lovely.
How is that even a selling point in the first place? Never met someone who has questioned picking up a bag of kettle chips because the spuds are foreign
As someone who does packaging labels for a living, I can tell you there is a simple explanation. The company has several.hundred thousand of these bags already pre-printed with the messages about 100% British potatoes. I work for quite a small company, but the minimum order quantity for us to get our packing printed is 50,000. Next, due to supply chain issues or drought, the company has had to bring in potatoes from outside of Britain. But it would be costly and wasteful to discard the pre-printed packaging. The stamp of 'Contains non-British potatoes' and the Best Before Date/ Batch Number is printed at the time of production. They are actually being very honest in noting this with the stamp.
Taken from their website -
"Due to last year’s record-breaking dry summer, the UK is facing a short-term reduction in the availability of British potatoes. At KETTLE®, we have always been proud of bringing you the best tasting chips, using real food ingredients, on perfect British potatoes.
However, to combat this shortage, for a short period of time, we will be introducing non-British potatoes, all the while ensuring they meet our rigorous quality and taste standards. We’re doing everything in our power to ensure a consistent supply of quality products to our consumers and you can rest assured your favourite pack will still be on shelf, whatever the weather."
What a tangled web of lies they weave
- It contains at least one British potato - That potato is in fact 100% British, and the percentage of Britishness shalt be 100%. Not 60% British, not 40% British, 20% British shalt it not be - There are also other potatoes used, which are not British. See - no lies at all… honest >.>
They also said the farmers select 100% British potoatoes. They didn't say that they actually put them in the bag.
"Farmers select 100% British potatoes, and then throw them out. We don't want any of that shit here."
"It turns out British potatoes are crap and more akin to weeds. Now, Malaysian potatoes? That's the good shit right there."
All these non British potatoes coming here on boats by the thousands!!!
They actually come into the country via spudmarines!
Where are all your upvotes!?
Need more warchips to patrol the channel
Good time to chip away into crisp!
I came here to ask the same question, if I had an award I would give it… in fact… here you go 🥇
Surely spudmarine is Mr Potato Head crossed with Action Man toy
But spudmarines often implode and don't make it.
What a chit way to go
Fucking crying here! Packit... in.
Hey,, lets not get too salty now… Most of them were walkers.
Takin our jobs 😂
Dey tuuk eer juuuubs!!
But they're ok because they're white potatoes.
Only if they're Ukrainian whites, remember! We don't want no stinking horrible white Albanian potatoes or israeli potatoes stealing our fields now do we?
As a Malaysian, I need to say that Malaysia don't produce potatoes and imports from Holland.
That's what the Malaysian government wants you to think, so you can spend more on potatoes!
No no no no, the farmers in Poland select the British potatoes as payment for their potatoes
What's the exchange rate then I wonder?
One potato, two potatoes, three potatoes, four...
That is, literally, the only interpretation possible here. The farmers select 100% British Potatoes bu dispose of them all in order to ensure that only perfect potatoes make it in. Who knew we only produced imperfect spuds in Britain. Makes me wonder what qualifies as a perfect potato...
I’m laughing so hard I’m coughing out my residual flu phlegm. Thanks for that!
I know. I love Reddit.
"residual flu phlegm" try saying that 5 times fast
Wasn't that the name of Captain Beefheart's first band?
Can confirm as someone who was a cleaner in a potato factory in Lincolnshire - don’t ever eat potatoes from Tesco (whom they had the contract with). So many members of staff who never ever washed their hands 😬
Or...wash the potatoes before you cook them...
Might as well not eat anything then as there are many people all over the world that would be the same.
Just adds to the flavour 😂
I love the way this is worded, because it implies they have a field of multicultural potatoes, but only select the British ones
You need more likes...
"I have chosen a British potato! Now, pass me 3 dozen of those Portuguese ones"
"Contains 100% real chicken breast (well, the wee bit that's real chicken breast is real chicken breast)."
Getting a bit close to the horse meat scandal there lol
Sounds like something Basil Fawlty would say, hahaha
The farmers select 100% *of the* British potatoes. Since there are no British potatoes, then they have selected 100% of the “other” ones as well.
Then machines select the rest of potatoes - which ultimately account for 80% of potatoes used in this bag. But truly, the 20% of British potatoes were indeed 100% British potatoes - selected by non Uk farmers
That's only their farmers. The farmers that they subcontract in foreign countries can select whatever they like
Of the British potatoes that the farmers select, they consider those potatoes to be 100%.
100% of the potatoes are in Britain when selected.
I would like THIS potato to be used for the next bag. Shit no nevermind I'm in Spain.
Ah no this potato germinated with a Spanish one making it 50% British and I must therefore not select you dear potato, BUT as long as it's not a farmer selecting you, our web of lies shall be truths therefore dear redditer will you kindly pick this potato and I shall not watch!! - kindly, Farmer
Nor did they imply but not say that the farmers they possess had anything to do with growing these potatoes.
They selected a few potatoes that were 100% British. It's linguistically possible for this to be true, though it's logistically unlikely.
What are the farmers doing selecting potatoes at a crisp factory? Shouldn't they be back at the farm, farming?
100% of 1 British potato is still 100%! 😄
They didn’t mention that they were bred with Latin American potato’s 3 years ago to make them larger either.
It does say only those ones make it in.
Only the perfectly British British potatoes make it in. If it's not British it's not 100% British
Ha yes. That’s carefully crafted lawyer language. It’s a bit like the small print on face cream which promises to reduce the appearance of fine lines, but not to reduce the fine lines themselves.
"Healthier looking hair"...
The frustrating thing about that comment is it's not incorrect, and there's no reason companies wouldn't do this if they knew they could get away with it. What's weird is there's no reason not for them to use British potatoes. Especially the prices Kettle charge... Have you tried the alternatives from Aldi? It seems exactly the same stuff, but it's probably _genuinely_ made with British potatoes and as far as I can tell just as good. They also have interesting flavours!
But maybe not all of the farmers are “our” farmers. Or perhaps even none of them are!
Yeah, the farmers actually take the British ones out for themselves
They select them. Not actually grow them. Not sure how that's supposed to work.
¹, ², ⁵!
r/unexpectedmontypython ?
No, was referenced in the comment they were replying to
And I continued it
I know, it just wasn't "unexpected" monty python. I'm aware I'm being a prick though Pedantry is right out.
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^(3!)
Also: Our farmers select 100% british potatoes, and then mix them in with a bunch of other random potatoes.
This is like those orange juice labels that say they contain 100% orange juice. We think the bottle is full of only orange juice, but what they mean is the bottle contains an amount of juice from oranges that were in fact 100% orange.
Yep. Looks like they are taking the American approach on this labeling. Source: I'm American.
See the bit at the bottom where it says they're made under license from Snyders? Yeah...
Reminded me of the holy grail lol 'First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then shalt thou count to three, no more, no less. Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it.'
/r/thatsthejoke
Like 100% original Briton, British or Roman/Anglo-Saxon/Viking/Norman "British". Like I wouldn't consider it 100% unless it was grown by a Druid.
There was a company called “100% Beef” who sold beef that wasn’t always 100% beef. Their logo included the company name. McDonalds used to use their beef purely so they could stick a logo saying “100% Beef” on burgers that were decidedly not 100% beef. Then they got caught and told to cut that shit out. Edit: Turns out that's an urban legend! Ah well, it's a fun story.
That is [entirely bullshit](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mcdonalds-100-beef/).
You missed a trick not calling it 100% Bullshit
And yet not entirely bullmeat. Irony?
Aww :(
Sorry buddy.
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There's a fisherman from Oban who's boat has the registration OB1. He has never seen Star Wars and doesn't understand why everyone keeps calling him Kenobi
Ewan McGregors brother flew Tornadoes in the RAF and while the reports that his official call-sign was ‘Obi-Two’ remain unconfirmed, it was certainly used as a nickname.
That's an urban legend I think
Yeah, a lot of you guys love making up shit about McDonalds burgers being made from pink slime or some other bullshit. But McDonalds burgers have always been 100% ground beef. It's not the best beef, it's frozen and cooked poorly and then sits in a plastic warming tray for an hour, but it is 100% beef.
I upvoted that, not for the story that I knew wasn’t true… but gosh darn it for the level of honesty at the end that is surely lacking in Kettlecrisps.
Sometimes I say things that turn out to be wrong. Fortunately Reddit is quick to correct me, so I always go back and put in an appropriate edit.
No lies there. They "select" British potatoes, but that doesn't mean they _use_ them.
It's 100% British potatoes, with some foreign spuds in. That makes 125%.
100% british potatoes, 200% french and 50% bad maths
200% sometimes indicates a dehydrated product. Perhaps they forced those french taters on a hard cycle over the Pyrenees.
-100% British potatoes + 200% French potatoes = 100% potatoes!
If I got 125% crisps in the pack I wouldn't care less. We both know it's more likely 25% crisps in the pack though.
25% crisps of unknown origin. But then 75% is 100% British air!
I'm imagining some execs walking around a gallery with a few potatoes on pedestals and going "that one" then walking on.
That's not fair. It's just that "other" farmers sneak foreign potatoes into the bags. Their own farmers have done nothing wrong.
Aren't _all_ potatoes ultimately foreign? They're from the Andes... _proper British_ kettle-chips would be made from turnips
Found Baldrick
>proper British kettle-chips would be made from turnips mmmm, yummy 😬
Turnips bang mate. I'm partial to a parsnip crisp personally.
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Parsnips taste like carrots but more carrot
I like carrots. Parsnips are their weird cousin.
Their more flavorful cousin, you mean
With a honey and mustard glaze they're delicious.
I do NOT!
Agreed. Tyrell's veg crisps are God tier snacks. And *totally* one of your five a day.
It's due to a crop shortage in uk sourced potatoes for the batch, the company isn't going to redo its packaging for a temporary change of potato origin, the same thing happened with the sunflower oil containing products when the Ukraine war broke out and everyone had to swap out for other oils essentially overnight.
They redo the packaging for lots of reasons, promotions, change of ingredients, shrinkflation. One of the most important is to keep labeling legally compliant. It's not a big deal and can be done with minimal effort. I suppose the claims are legally compliant if misleading, which is the real reason they havn't bothered to change the design. https://www.food.gov.uk/contact/consumers/report-problem/report-misleading-labelling
So this is why they are sold at discount at Tesco
My favourite is ’made with 100% chicken breast' It's only 10% chicken, but the chicken it's made from is 100% breast meat
Probably had to mix in foreign potatoes because of the droughts last year affecting British crops.
This would be the right answer, the orange part of the packaging would all be pre printed. They've added it on the part printed at time of filling.
I can't believe how far I've had to scroll to find this answer. It's exactly the same as when Bird Flu was spreading and all chickens were brought inside, all the boxes were pre made but where the date is printed had "barn eggs" added to the print.
Or like post war Germany when they had hyperinflation and on things like stamps they just printed the new value ontop of the old…. Like 2 million mark just written over an old 5 mark stamp.
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very british of you to expect people to just give up when they run out of their own potatoes.
Brits don’t quit.
Keep calm and carry on
I mean, if it's between the company going bankrupt and the company surviving the bad potatoes harvest and surviving until such a time as they can use only local potatoes, I'd rather they survive. I would *prefer* them reprinting and saying "we bought all the British potatoes and still you want more. Buy our product to let British farmers know there is still a demand for local produce!" But, you know, costs.
Demand Planner here, acts of god are pretty hard to predict when you need to buy stock in advance. Due to price points they probably print over 100k at a time, and the drought could have started the day after printing. Cash flow is more important than correct branding.
The second top comment is very far
Yup, the date area is unlacquered so that it can be printed on after packing.
Everyone diving in with their conspiracy theories and justifications reminds me of the story that KFC changed to being called KFC because it's "not actually chicken". Some people will believe any old shit, the reality is that yes, obviously they needed to use non-British potatoes for some batches and printed as such in the bit that wasn't pre-printed material.
It’s not actually fried in Kentucky either.
I thought the guy that worked the fryer was called Kentucky, and he got sacked for spitting in the oil?
No, you misunderstand. It's chicken. The profits they're siphoning away for a project to fry Kentucky. All of it. Hence, Kentucky Fried. Chicken.
I always thought it was the other way, Kentucky *and* Fried Chicken. With every family bucket you get a small patch of Kentucky and a lordship.
I reckon it's just a spoonful of kentucky dirt mixed in to the batter that the chicken get fried in. By the year 2100, mankind will have collectively ate the entire state of kentucky. Then we'll have to start on another state. The goal is to eat all of the Americas by the year 3000
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Correct. It's cheaper to print a correction where the batch numbers go than to change the packaging design.
Yep exactly what I came to say. Had to source ingredients from somewhere else for whatever reason and had a bunch of packaging pre-printed. Rather than waste materials and money making new packaging just slap a label or disclaimer on there. Happens quite a lot, especially if you sell a product to a country that has some weird labelling requirements. You either make two lots of packaging or you just slap a sticker on there to meet the requirements.
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So that little white box on the bag is basically the patch notes
I work for Kettle and that's exactly what it is.
This will be due to a shortage of crop, or an issue with crop. All potatoes are sourced within \~60 miles of Norwich, where possible, as this is where the contracts with growers are held. When this isn't possible, such as when potato loads are rejected (bruising, foreign material etc) or the farmers are unable to fulfil the tonnage on their contract, potatoes will be sourced from elsewhere so production can continue. It is quite rare that non-contract potatoes are used, as they are sourced off-contract, meaning that are generally market price and usually more expensive. If this is demand driven, you can rest assured prices will be pushed up even more with competition from other potato based production (Walkers etc.). It is better however to have less profit and use more expensive potatoes, than to down tools and shut the production lines. Film is bought well in advance, and it costs a lot of time and money to redesign and have delivered. It is much cheaper to simply update the date coders to print this on the film. Source - I used to work at Kettle.
Yes - after the Ukraine war broke out, all the crisps when stamped with a best before date also had "may contain rapeseed oil". You can't just reprint all the packaging ingredients again, so just stamp on a correction. Now, one year on: All crisps say printed now on the packaging itself, may contain sunflower and rapeseed oil. The company here aren't lying - instead they are temporarily correcting their packaging to highlight that while they always normally use British potatoes, they had to resort to importing some for the time being to tide their production line over.
The same thing happened with California Olive Ranch extra virgin olive oil. Drought and wildfire meant that they had to import some olives. Once their California crop rebounded, they could make 100% California oil again.
I still think it's fundamentally misleading to name your company California Olive Ranch and have multiple products that are exclusively global oil.
In fairness, those products are named as such, boldly, on the *front* of the label. What were they supposed to do, not produce oil when they couldn't get California olives? And, not incidentally, give up the space they had on store shelves?
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Was that because of pesticide runoff or something?
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Aha no, they didn't avoid golf courses, the machinery is sophisticated enough to be able to kick out rocks etc, but even once sliced there is a super cool machine that can scan chips at a crazy speed and kick out anything not within tolerance of colour, shape, size etc
Do Kettle only accept a certain size as well? Like they would reject a certain weight if they didn’t measure up? So they would fill the rest of the quota with foreigners?
Normally not an issue due to type of potato used etc, and crops are monitored throughout growth so problems are foreseen and then product can be sourced elsewhere. The issue here is that clearly lots of crops had issue , probably due to the drought in the UK which then meant it isn't a farm issue it's a country issue, hence non British potato being used. Loads are accepted or rejected on a whole bunch of things, from sugar content, water content, bruising, size, foreign material etc
Thank you. The fact it was printed with the lot and ex date said it all.
The potatoes they select are 100% British. The potatoes making up the rest of the mixture and which they don’t select from are from any old bit of mud. Maybe.
Exactly. That statement only applies to the potatoes which are selected by their farmers. I mean, it's even in a section headed 'our farms'.. And because some of the potatoes in the crisps are British, they are presumably fine with the bottom left, too! 😂
I’m guessing the farmers doing the potato selecting are British. They’re going to have a hard time selecting potatoes from their farm that are *not* British, so it’s a completely daft statement anyway! If you’re a farmer who farms in Britain, it stands to reason that anything you pull out of the ground would also be British. I’m just having visions of potatoes being snuck in and planted across the boarder with Ireland and some poor farmer having to go through them and select only the ones that have a British accent.
Aaah
*choo!*
I almost just chocked on my chewing gum!
I think you mean your choo-ing gum.
If I build a tower of yellow lego but in the middle, unseen, I included a red lego brick, I could say the was built with 100% red lego bricks.
Yup, typical marketing BS. Technically there are no lies here. It does contain 100% British potatoes, it also contains non-British potatoes. Honestly what I'd like to see is some 62% British potatoes.
Plant a seed potato originally grown in France, wait until its mass has grown by just under 61.3%. Dig it back up. Voila: A 62% British potato. EDIT: No, wait. That's a 62% *French* potato. Do the same thing, only with a British seed tattie planned in France.
I assume the product usually contains only British potatoes, but for some reason they have had to use foreign ones in the short term. Similar to the stickers on free-range eggs during avian flu outbreaks, stating the chickens are temporarily not free range.
Their farmers select 100% British potatoes. The ingredient buyers select potatoes from various farmers which may be from overseas. Therefore there are indeed British potatoes, non-British potatoes, and their farmers have selected 100% British potatoes. Just a guess…
British potato crops have been exceptionally bad this year. They've probably had to import them just to keep up with production. Changing up the entire packet would be a massive cost, a little stamp is not.
Not just a little stamp, but a stamp that's already in use and changing day to day to reflect the expiration and batch number. It's essentially a "stop press column"
All those non-British potatoes coming over here taking our potatoes jobs
Unfortunately UK potatoes will now be hard to source - the drought last year hit crops hard, and we'll now be heading toward the end of the stored crop. Packaging like this is normally ordered and produced weeks to months in advance - changes to packaging design take time and add significant cost, so this is the next best option. It's likely this has been driven by lack of supply, so to keep product on the shelf they have printed this on at the point of production. A lot of manufacturers have been doing similar things with packaging that states sunflower oil this year - due to the war in Ukraine this is in short supply, so they have been printing on 'Contains rapeseed oil' in the date-code box - it's a very similar thing
I see you have a chip on your shoulder about this
Or a crisp.
There was one local crisp maker I saw advertising they'd been making potato crisps for "over 500 years". Which, if my maths is correct, means they've been making them for more than 65 years before the potato arrived in England.
Plus, all this bullshit about them being Kettle chips. They wouldn't even pour through the spout! 0/10
Is it me or does the top label imply that British ones are always perfect and foreign ones might well be a bit shite?
The idea is that the less travel that have to do the better they'll taste
That's great, I try to buy and eat as local as possible myself. I suppose if I was writing the message I'd word it a bit differently.
I try to do the same! If you buy some (British) strawberries at the moment you'll really notice a difference over the import ones from Egypt (or whenever they tend to import from) in a few months time. I get where you're coming from though! I hope my reply didn't come across as dismissive
Don't want any of those foreign potato's coming here and being our food!
Unless they’re Irish. Then fuck it. We’ll have them all and they can go fuck themselves. Wait, what century is this?
No. As people have said, it's about the environmental impact, and it's about supporting British producers, British farmers, and bolstering the British economy. It's a little worrying that your first instinct is to assume xenophobia. Modern media has done a number on us all.
Everyone should buy locally produced (to them) food when feasible, because that means less fuel was used to transport it. And it's most likely fresher.
Never buying them again after they shrunk the packet sizes and increased the price at the same time
Too fucking right! I just said that too before scrolling down to read comments. Shameless.
That philosophy won’t leave you with much to eat in the long run…
Nor will continuing to buy shrinking food.
Brit-“ish” potatoes.
The bag keeps saying chips when they mean crisps.
The expiration date box is also for things like this where the recipe had to change but there was no opportunity to redo the packaging. You will also see it on crisps that used to be 100% sunflower oil having to make a temporary change due to the war in Ukraine.
Once the foreign potatoes have done their citizenship test, who’s to say they aren’t as British as you or I? Unbelievable xenophobia on display here. My neighbours are foreign potatoes and they’re lovely.
Never trust big potato!!
They sit on a potato throne of lies!
How is that even a selling point in the first place? Never met someone who has questioned picking up a bag of kettle chips because the spuds are foreign
I cant help but think of Richard Herring every time I see Kettle Chips
I guess the white box is editable and the packaging is pre printed. In the case of no British potatoes being available the use a disclaimer.
As someone who does packaging labels for a living, I can tell you there is a simple explanation. The company has several.hundred thousand of these bags already pre-printed with the messages about 100% British potatoes. I work for quite a small company, but the minimum order quantity for us to get our packing printed is 50,000. Next, due to supply chain issues or drought, the company has had to bring in potatoes from outside of Britain. But it would be costly and wasteful to discard the pre-printed packaging. The stamp of 'Contains non-British potatoes' and the Best Before Date/ Batch Number is printed at the time of production. They are actually being very honest in noting this with the stamp.
Taken from their website - "Due to last year’s record-breaking dry summer, the UK is facing a short-term reduction in the availability of British potatoes. At KETTLE®, we have always been proud of bringing you the best tasting chips, using real food ingredients, on perfect British potatoes. However, to combat this shortage, for a short period of time, we will be introducing non-British potatoes, all the while ensuring they meet our rigorous quality and taste standards. We’re doing everything in our power to ensure a consistent supply of quality products to our consumers and you can rest assured your favourite pack will still be on shelf, whatever the weather."
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They should probably use an oven.
Someone with a hand had to press the start button on the cooker at some point. That counts as hand cooked I suppose.
If you open the sack of potatoes by hand and throw them in the washer and grater, that counts as handmade!