The potato farmer who swapped bankruptcy for making millions

For a Herefordshire potato farmer, William Chase is
impressively savvy about the need for positive publicity,
and the importance of telling a good story.
It is a talent that helped him move from being bankrupt,
aged 32, to becoming a multimillionaire by the time he was
48.
Along the way he created and sold best-selling upmarket
crisps brand Tyrrells, and won a high-profile battle against
supermarket giant Tesco.
Now 56, and the founder and owner of Chase Vodka, a
luxury version of the spirit made from potatoes grown on
his farm, the serial entrepreneur says: "People love stories,
the real stories behind things.
"And the media was very important to me from the first
days of Tyrrells.
"I was a guy who had been beaten up by the supermarkets,
and people love to support the underdog."
'Ashamed'
The son of potato farmers who lived near the Herefordshire
town of Leominster, Mr Chase bought the family farm from
his dad when he was 20 after he "managed to find a bank
manager brave enough to lend me £200,000".
As the cost of potatoes can rise and fall sharply, business
was up and down for the next 12 years, until torrential rain
in 1992 meant he couldn't harvest his crop, which he had
to leave to rot in the fields.
Overextended financially, the business collapsed, and Mr
Chase had to file for bankruptcy. He says: "I was very
ashamed and embarrassed."
After "running away to Australia" for a few months, he
returned to Herefordshire, and was able to borrow funds to
buy back the farm from the receivers, and start up in
business again.
This time, to make extra money, he became a potato
trader, buying spuds from a number of farms, and then
selling them on to supermarkets.
Yet while he got himself back on his feet financially, Mr
Chase says he became increasingly frustrated that
supermarkets would reject potatoes that weren't
"cosmetically perfect".
He adds: "I'd send off 10 loads of spuds every day, and I'd
be getting five back. It was very painful how the
supermarkets were treating us farmers."
Mr Chase's life-changing moment came in 2002 when he
found out that rejected potatoes were being bought up by
the UK operation of US crisp-maker Kettle.
At the time Kettle was one of new companies making so-
called "posh crisps", potato crisps which were cut a little
thicker than the mass-market brands, and fried by hand.
Despite having no crisp-making experience or knowledge,
Mr Chase was convinced he could set up his own
upmarket crisps brand.
So he phoned a few UK crisp-makers to ask if he could
see how they did things, and all said "no". Undeterred, he
flew out to the US and visited facilities in Pennsylvania
and Colorado.
Returning to the UK, he built a crisp-making facility at the
family farm, and Tyrrells [taking its name from the
property] was up and running six months later.
Tesco row
Quick to tell his story to local newspapers to build up
publicity, Mr Chase hit the road to spend two weeks
visiting independent food shops across the UK with
samples of his crisps.
He says: "Tyrrells grew and grew very quickly, and it was
a brilliant cash cow. We'd sell the bags to shops for £1
and they would retail them for £2. For us the net profit was
35%."
Supermarkets such as Waitrose soon followed suit, but Mr
Chase was adamant that he would not sell to the largest -
Tesco - because he didn't like what he saw as the
pressure it put on farmers to lower their prices.
Then one day in 2006 a friend told him that Tesco was
selling Tyrrells' crisps. It transpired that Tesco had been
buying them on the grey market, and selling them below
the recommended retail price.
An incensed Mr Chase demanded that Tesco stop selling
them. After the supermarket refused, Mr Chase started a
media campaign that included an appearance on BBC
Radio 4's Today programme. Tesco then did back down.
With sales of Tyrrells crisps continuing to grow over the
next few years, and annual turnover hitting £14m, Mr
Chase borrowed money from his bank to expand
production. The condition the bank set was that he had to
bring in a management team to help him run the business.
Mr Chase, who had previously been very hands on, and
liked to help out with all parts of the business, says that
bringing in new managers ultimately changed the business
- to its detriment.
"We got to a stage where I didn't like where the business
was going," he says. "We were employing corporate people
who were arranging meetings about more meetings."
Unhappy with Tyrrells' new big business ethos, and going
through a "messy divorce", Mr Chase - who was the sole
shareholder - decided to sell up in 2008 to a private
capital business for almost £40m.
Spirits business
Looking for a new business venture, and with the new
owners of Tyrrells choosing to buy their potatoes from
elsewhere, Mr Chase came up with the idea of turning his
spuds into premium vodka.
So with money no longer a problem, he bought a
distillation system, and Chase Vodka was born.
Aimed at the luxury end of the market, it retails for £35 a
bottle.
While Mr Chase admits it isn't anywhere near as profitable
as selling crisps, it appears to be very much a labour of
love. And focused very much on exports, he spends a lot of
time travelling the world to build up sales.
And showing that he has lost little of his public relations
skills, every year he flies influential barmen and women
from around the world to visit his farm in Herefordshire to
see how the potatoes are grown, and vodka is made.
Also now making a gin and a whisky, the Chase Distillery
sells 10,000 bottles a week.
Mr Chase says: "You have to tell people your story if you
want to build your brand. But there has to be real DNA
behind it if you want to be successful."