Postal pies a taste of home for Black Country expats
A pie delivery business in the Black Country set up during Covid-19 has taken off nationally thanks to expats desperate to taste a slice of home.
Pete Towler, owner of Mad O'Rouke's Pie Factory in Tipton, started Pies By Post in March this year while his restaurant was shut due to the virus.
Mr Towler had expected people in the region to order – but was surprised when orders came in from Edinburgh, Aberdovey, London and Padstow.
And he soon realised many of the orders for pies that were coming from hundreds of miles away were being made by former Black Country residents.
He said: "We knew we had to do something to start bringing in some revenue after the terrible year we’d just managed to get through. We had the kitchen facilities and the talented chefs to be able to start the pie delivery service, and Pies by Post was born.
"But as a new online venture, we were surprised when we started getting really far-flung orders from hundreds of miles away.
"I started asking people how they’d heard about us, and it turned out that almost all of them had been born in the Black Country before moving out to different areas.
"They had all been to The Pie Factory at some point in their lives - some more regularly than others - and they were all hankering for a taste of home. It seems you can leave the Black Country, but it never leaves you!"
Mr Towler said a lot of his pie deliveries are also going out closer to home as well as nationally, adding: "It’s not just people who used to live in the Black Country who are ordering deliveries. One of our regulars placed an online order for a pie delivery - and she only lives round the corner in the next street. It did make me smile and I delivered them to her myself, but I can’t give everyone that kind of personal service!"
For more information visit madpiesonline.co.uk
