Speciality Food - October 2025

4 @specialityfood EDITOR’S LETTER 32 6 John Shepherd Partridges 10 Oliver Lloyd consultant 30 James Grant No6 Pound Street REGULARS 14 TrendWatch: Tea 16 Product News 21 Centre Spread: Gifting 30 Cheese Uncut 27 Counterpoint: Scooping Gorgonzola 38 Last Words FEATURES 18 The Proof Is In the Baking 22Master Festive Merchandising 24 Staying Home Is Where It's At 26What's Trending for Christmas 2025 28 A Christmas Classic 32 Best of British 36 "Having It All" W elcome to the October issue of Speciality Food . Autumn is well and truly here – golden sunshine ismaking way for chilly nights, and consumers across the UK are hunkering down and starting to plan for Christmas. In this issue we share plenty of inspiration to get you ready for the most valuable season of the year, from the trends worth knowing to help shape the offering on your shelves tomerchandising hints and tips to inspire you tomake themost of what you have (and create a little magic in the process). We also share some of our favourite gift-ready products that will fly off the shelves when your customers get into gifting mode, tell the story of one of the Christmas cheeseboard'smost iconic centrepieces, and highlight the joys of excellent British cheese – complete with plenty of pairing suggestions to help boost your cheese counter sales. All that, and we delve into the opportunity that party season represents, too – from the products to stock and why to how to merchandise and upsell them, it's a great read. Until next time. HOLLY SHACKLETON | EDITOR holly.shackleton@artichokehq.com 36 18