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Pie perfection

Liberty Horner is the first trainee graduate that pork pie manufacturer, Vale of Mowbray, has taken on and she is already making her mark.

The 23-year-old Food Science and Nutrition graduate has helped to save the company £100,000 by reducing waste since joining as a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) associate and is now working on saving a further £100,000 from current projects. ‘And that’s just for starters’, said Liberty, who has many more ideas about helping the firm improve its business operation.

Pork pie production is gearing up three times the normal output to meet the Christmas rush – so it’s a case of all hands on deck at the North Yorkshire based Vale of Mowbray.

Liberty joined the company in 2008, after briefly working at Newcastle Brewery as a microbiologist.

She said: ‘I saw details of the º£½ÇÖ±²¥ KTP and immediately realised it was the ideal next move for me.’

KTPs are government-backed and encourage companies that don’t normally work with universities to employ a postgraduate student and gain direct access to university scientists and other expertise to improve their businesses.

Academics benefit from applying theory to practice on live projects and gain up-to-date experience of the commercial world which they can use in their teaching and research.

A win-win situation For graduates like Liberty, it is a ‘win-win’ situation. They get their first foot on their chosen career ladder while studying up to master’s level or beyond and receive training and financial support. And very importantly, they often get offered a permanent contract when the two-year KTP comes to an end. In Liberty’s case, she’s now the firm’s Product Improvement Co-ordinator at the Vale of Mowbray.

Sheree Walker, the company’s Production Manager, has no doubt about the value of having Liberty.

“She’s already saved us a small fortune by changing the way we dispose of waste packaging of raw materials such as flour and now she’s looking at new ways to maintain the perfect pastry and helping us to ensure greater consistency in both measurement and quality control in the pie-making process’, explained Sheree.

Liberty has worked closely with her º£½ÇÖ±²¥ supervisor, Dr Liam 0’Hare, a biochemist and food scientist, on the project while working towards her Master of Research in Science.

Dr O’Hare, said: ‘Liberty has been a great KTP Associate. She’s done loads of innovative things off her own back - and together we’ve helped the company to introduce some new technology and new ways of working to better measure and monitor quality assurance and quality control.’

John Gatenby, Managing Director of the company, added: ‘We’re always striving to make the perfect pie and achieve greater consistency from one pie to the next.

‘Having access to the wide range of resources at the University has been an enormous help and we wish to continue working with º£½ÇÖ±²¥ in the future. Liberty has been a great addition to the team - she’s got a really creative approach and is always looking for ways we can improve the business.’

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