Borough Broth has expanded beyond its core broth portfolio with the introduction of two “non-UPF” gravy products.
Proper Beef Gravy and Proper Chicken Gravy follow the company’s established approach of using ‘real’ ingredients and avoiding unnecessary additions. The products also reflect wider food and beverage industry trends, including demand for recognisable ingredients and convenient meal solutions.
Proper Beef Gravy is built on Borough Broth’s slow-simmered broth, prepared with grass-fed bones. Organic herbs and organic red wine complete the recipe. Proper Chicken Gravy uses the company’s slow-cooked chicken bone broth, combined with organic herbs and organic white wine for a lighter flavour profile.
Both products are chilled and ready to heat and serve. They provide consumers with a homemade-style option without the time required to prepare gravy from scratch.
The launch follows Borough Broth’s introduction of ‘UPF-free’ frozen broth cubes, which the business positions as a ‘healthier alternative’ to conventional stock cubes. The move reflects current food and drink consumer trends, as shoppers increasingly seek convenient products that align with their expectations around ingredients and processing.
“The driver behind the gravy launch was really about taking what we know and do well in bone broth into a natural adjacent category,” Ros Heathcote, founder and CEO of Borough Broth, told Food Manufacture.
“Great gravy starts with a great broth, so it made sense for us to use our slow-cooked bone broth as the foundation and create something that gives people the convenience of a truly tasty and ready-made gravy without compromising on the quality of the ingredients or how it’s made.
“In a world where everything can be made instantly, we want to celebrate the things that are still made well.”
The range extension comes after Borough Broth secured a £7.5 million investment package from consumer-focused investment firm Piper last year. The funding is supporting the company’s next stage of development, including its transition to a new factory in Greenford, west London.
Scheduled for completion at the end of the year, the facility will more than double the manufacturer’s existing capacity. Although Borough Broth did not use the new site to produce the gravy, Heathcote says the investment will play an important role in the business’s longer-term expansion.
“Our new manufacturing facility hasn’t been used to produce this gravy range, so it wasn’t what enabled the launch, however the investment is very much about where Borough Broth goes next,” she said.
“We had significantly outgrown our previous site, and the new facility will give us 27,400 sq ft, enabling us to increase production footprint by 600%, more than seven times our previous cooking capabilities.
“That additional capacity and flexibility is really important as we grow. It means we can meet increasing demand for our core broth range while giving us much more scope to innovate, develop new products and explore adjacent categories like gravy in the future.”
The expansion highlights the role of scalable food processing technology, production capacity and food manufacturing trends in supporting innovation within the food and drink industry. It also gives Borough Broth greater flexibility to respond to food and drink consumer trends while developing products that fit evolving expectations around food and drink sustainability.
Borough Broth has raised £783,000 through angel investment and now generates annualised revenue of approximately £11 million. The company expects turnover to surpass £20 million in 2026.
The new Proper Beef Gravy and Proper Chicken Gravy are available in more than 200 Sainsbury’s stores. Each product is sold in a 400g pack with a recommended retail price of £5.
As the business grows, its expansion will also intersect with wider food distribution trends, food and drink packaging requirements, food and drink regulations and changing approaches to food and drink marketing. Together, these factors continue to shape food and drink industry innovation across the category.
