Verso Food Oy – the Finnish Fava Bean expert – and their flag ship product Härkis® Original received the VegeAwards-prize for Best Vegetarian Protein. The winners of VegeAwards were announced at the popular vegetarian food fair Vegemessut. The winners were chosen by a consumer vote and over 7000 votes were cast in the first ever Finnish VegeAwards-competition.
VegeAwards is the first Finnish competition and prize for vegetarian products, brands and services. The organizer of the competition, Vegefirma believes that companies, brands and people who work for vegan products should be rewarded for their work towards a world with a more fair, sustainable and better food chain.
Härkis® Original, which is made from Finnish Fava Beans has been on the market for 18 months and a success from day one. Yet the victorius award came as a pleasant surprise to Verso Food Ltd, who market the product. ”We are very grateful for every vote and especially for each and every consumer who uses our products every day, week and month” says Sonja Hakala, Product Manager at Verso Food Ltd. The other nominees in this extremely popular category were Pulled Oats, The Vegetarian Butcher, Oumph!, Pulled Peas and Finnish tofu manufacturer Jalotofu. VegeAwards also rewarded the best brand, best vegetarian milk, best vegetarian ice cream, best ready-to-eat product, best newcomer and best social media platform.
Härkis® was one of the main sponsors of Vegemessut that were held over the past weekend in Helsinki. At their popular Härkis® stand Verso Food Ltd offered tastings of their newly launched Härkis® Original and Kofta balls. ”According to our calculations over 6000 people tasted our products and even more so came to visit our stand. During my long career in the food business I have never experienced this type of enthusiasm at a food fair before” says Jaakko Päivinen, Sales Manager at Verso Food Oy. Over 8000 people visited Vegemessut, which were held only for the second time ever in Kaapelitehdas in Helsinki.
For more information:
Verso Food Oy & Härkis®-products: Sonja Hakala, Product Manager, sonja.hakala@versofood.fi
Vegeawards/Vegemessut: Suvi Auvinen, Producer, suvi.auvinen@vegefirma.fi