Middle Eastern food gains ground in Finland
When Hratch Maroutian came to Sweden from Beirut in 1967, there was hardly any clothes in his bag, instead it was full of eastern spices, bulgur and olive oil. The strong traditions and the love of meze food led him to found the company Sevan – today market-leading in Sweden when it comes to food from the Middle East, on the rise also in Finland. Text: Anna Sand • Picture: Linda Svarfvar and press images from Sevan The first import to Sweden started in 1988 and the company was founded the following year. Today it is managed by the two sons. Currently Sevan has a bit over 40 employees, a turnover of 350 million SEK and sales offices also in Norway and in Finland, countries to which a great deal of the export goes via daily express service. – We are growing strongly within the Finnish retail trade. We have also been doing well within the restaurant business, but the past year has of course been a unique one, Annika Kumpunen, sales manager in Finland, states. She tells us that the Finns are curious about meze food and have become much quicker to catch new trends during recent years. – The consumers’ interest has not died down during the year – quite the opposite – they have had more time to think about things like cooking. So far hummus and falafel are the products that sell the best in Finland, followed by different legumes.
6
– Here we have much more to give, Kumpunen further believes. Besides the import of eastern food, Sevan has for a few years now also had their own production, in a brand new hummus factory in Rosersberg north of Stockholm. – In the same building we now also have our main office, and here the everyday food of the future with inspiration from the Middle East is produced, packaged and distributed. The factory is logistically nicely located next to the E4 and the goal is to become northern Europe’s leading hummus manufacturer, Kumpunen continues. Sevan has been operative on the Finnish market since 2012 and for just as long they have had Scandic Trans as logistics partner. – Our earlier collaborations left me very pleased with them, and thanks to their terminal in Turku and the daily express traffic between the capital city and Stockholm, we quickly get our fresh food out to the
