A FARMHOUSE preserves business which has tripled production in six months has won two major awards.

Derek and Lesley Kettlewell's Raydale Preserves has won the Great British Foods award and was runner-up in the farming entrepreneur of the year award in the regional heats of the NFU president's award.

Mr and Mrs Kettlewell have won £300 cash, two certificates and automatic entry into the national finals, whose winners will be announced in February.

"We are very pleased to have won; we did not expect to but we are delighted," said Mrs Kettlewell.

Mr and Mrs Kettlewell featured in the D&S Times in July last year when we reported how, in 1998, they had made 3,500 jars of jam and chutney in pans on the farmhouse cooker.

The couple's business plan was to triple production to 16,000 jars a year by 2003.

"But we have tripled production in the last six months," said Mrs Kettlewell. "The demand has been so great we have been making 1,000 jars a month."

And, amazingly, they have managed to match that huge growth while still using the kitchen stove at their School House Farm, Stalling Busk, near Askrigg, in Wensleydale.

Conversion work on an adjoining disused farm building should now be completed by the end of this month.

The couple received grant aid for the work under objective 5b funding and North Yorkshire County Council's farm diversification initiative.

The conversion will provide two kitchen areas, storage space and a small display area and shop and the Kettlewells can't wait to start production from there.

Mrs Kettlewell began making her own jams and chutneys some 15 years ago when one of her three sons was found to be allergic to anything artificial, such as colourings or preservatives.

Her father owns Elijah Allen, the well-known Hawes grocery, and invited her to sell her surplus jars through the shop.

Mrs Kettlewell still works in the shop during the day, then spends four hours or more each night making more jams, chutneys, and jelly preserves in her kitchen.

Today she produces more than 40 varieties, all of which contain only natural, pure ingredients - not even setting agents are used.

Following requests, the Kettlewells have now started producing hampers, too.

Although some fruit has to be bought from a wholesaler they buy as much as possible from local sources. They have an arrangement with a local grower who supplies strawberries, raspberries, gooseberries and tayberries and they then supply him with preserves.

It has worked to the advantage of both parties.

Seven months ago they supplied several shops and outlets in an area from Lancaster, York, Batley and Barnard Castle, but since then demand has grown and more shops in Bainbridge, Reeth, Askrigg, Hunton, Kilnsey, Skipton, Leeming Lodge, and Doncaster are stocking Raydale Preserves.

The Wensleydale Dairy at Hawes also stocks them and takes them out on their delivery vans.

Mr Kettlewell still looks after the farm, where the 385 acres support 25 suckler cows and 380 sheep, but he has become more involved with the preserves, particularly on the promotional side.

He has attended farmers' markets in York and Kendal, a Harrogate flower show and a food and drink festival in York as a member of the Yorkshire Pantry. All attracted extra business.

Mrs Kettlewell has been making and selling her preserves for some 15 years but the family decided to go into it in a much bigger way when the downturn in farm incomes began to bite.

Mr Kettlewell's parents moved to the farm in 1940 and he went into partnership with his mother when his father died in 1978.

A great supporter of conservation, he has rebuilt an amazing 1,952 metres of stone walls since 1994, entered 112ha into countryside stewardship and 42 hectares into an environmentally sensitive area.

He is the first to admit that, without Raydale Preserves, the steep decline in farm incomes would probably have forced them to quit the farm.

In the relatively short time he has been on the farm, Mr Kettlewell has seen the number of farms in Stalling Busk decline from seven to just two.

The village now has 12 houses, of which six are holiday homes, three retired, the two farms and one other.

But, thanks to the success of the preserves, the Kettlewells are not only building themselves a more secure future but soon hope to be able to create two jobs for local people.

Raydale Preserves can be contacted on 01969 650233