Cambridgeshire bakery Nutty Tarts is increasing its distribution to Waitrose stores and is planning to expand into London.

The business currently supplies around 40 sites, including 23 Waitrose outlets, in the area, as well as the Andaz Hotel in Liverpool Street, London.

Nutty Tarts met with Waitrose representatives earlier this month to discuss rolling its products out across more stores nationally.

“The meeting went really well, so we are going to crack on with that,” said managing director Deborah Armiger. “We need to change a couple of products so they are suitable for the national market rather than the regional. This will involve possibly taking out some of the shorter shelf-life products as we will be going for national distribution into Waitrose’s distribution centre and products will need a good shelf-life.

"We will be working on that in the next couple of months and some products are already in manufacturing.” The companies are in discussion to see how many more sites the products will go into.

London focus

“We also want to focus on increasing our business in London,” said Armiger.

The company launched individually-wrapped products last month in its Essence range, comprising carrot cake, cherry and almond cake, spicy sultana slice, Black Forest cake, and toffee, walnut and date cake. The range has opened the way to target establishments from hotels and shops to universities and schools.

“We are passionate about baking in small batches as we are not mass producers. We have the distribution process in place and supply universities, coffee shops and food supply companies, as well as posting to consumers.

Nutty Tarts is also extending its gluten-free range by demand, which currently includes a chocolate brownie and a lemon drizzle cake, which is also dairy-free.