Future looks bright with confetti

looks at a marriage made in heaven.

With the closure of the Allscott sugar beet factory, farmer Jonathan Bubb knew he desperately needed to diversify.

And his lightbulb moment probably came when he heard that churchyards were banning confetti.

"There were a lot of problems with churchyards and problems with non-biodegradable confetti," says Jonathan, 31, who today runs one of the country's only existing confetti farms at Lynn Farm South, near Newport.

"We then realised that ours was completely biodegradable, just as natural as flowers that die in the garden."

He began contacting county clergy, suggesting they could use his dried-flower confetti at wedding services, and was encouraged by their response.

With its production of fragrant delphinium, poppies and sunflowers, Shropshire Petals, the confetti-producing part of the farm set-up, was about to bloom.

"We approached vicars and sent letters letters to them - 'we know you don't like paper confetti, when you have a wedding why don't you use real petals'?"

They did. Then he approached wedding fayres who followed suit. Hotels which held civil weddings came on board too, using Jonathan's real confetti as part of their wedding packages.

Indeed, the first wedding where his confetti was thrown was his own - to wife Antonia.

Lynn Farm South, a family-run operation established by Jonathan's father Michael Bubb, has been producing dried flowers for 20 years. That was another venture whose floral roots can be found in unusual places - it blossomed after Nan Bubb, Jonathan's grandmother, used to take them to WI meetings and without exception would return home empty handed.

But recently with the dried flower market shrivelling up somewhat as trends in the home leaned towards minimalist decoration, the confetti farm is the perfect marriage between the two ventures.

And in the season of wedding bells it is just such a diversification that is key to the continued fortunes of Shropshire farms such as Lynn Farm South which over the years have come to rely on the beleaguered sugar beet industry.

According to a report commissioned by the NFU the closure of Allscott's sugar beet factory is having a direct impact on local business. Local contractors alone stand to lose over £24 million worth of business.

Gloomy as this news is, Jonathan is one farmer who has taken drastic measures to compensate for the loss of his sugar beet crop that would have otherwise stood for around one-sixth of his farm's income.

Jonathan explains: "Having lost sugar beet, we are concentrating our efforts on other areas - potatoes and flowers are our main areas and confetti is a growing part of our business."

But 18 months ago when Jonathan suggested to his father Michael, now 57, that they should grow flowers to be used as confetti for weddings or special events he was greeted with raised eyebrows.

Confetti might not be the obvious choice to hardy men of the soil, but in the short time since Shropshire Petals was established it has been widely recognised for its innovative approach and the quality of its natural product, as well as showing other farmers that diversifying their business can be the lifeline they've been looking for.

It's this innovative approach and passion for farming that has made Shropshire Petals a number one supplier of confetti in the UK.

This summer is crucial for the fortunes of Lynn Farm South and Shropshire Petals.

"This is the first year without sugar beet so it's a test to make up the same gross farming margin," says Jonathan who says that 50 acres of farmland will be dedicated confetti fields.

Both he and his sales manager Angela Fellows are hoping for a bumper wedding season and are confident that the business will build on its success of having become the number one supplier of real confetti in the UK.

The bottom line is that women love flowers and real confetti fits into this thinking. Angela is woman and she knows about these things.

"You want something special for the big day," she says.

"Every girl imagines they are going to get married once and they want 'the works'.

"And the smell . . ."

Confetti farming has brought other changes to the way this once traditional farmer might have operated, such as having to oversee the launch of a website, www.shropshirepetals.co.uk, and taking on marketing duties. But it is a change he is relishing.

Here is one Shropshire farm which, in the face of adversity, is proving that the future can be rosy.