Owners Duncan Smith (right) and Annabel Tapley-Smith have brought the business which has been providing Havelock North's meat goods for 92 years. Photo / Warren Buckland
Owners Duncan Smith (right) and Annabel Tapley-Smith have brought the business which has been providing Havelock North's meat goods for 92 years. Photo / Warren Buckland
Owners Duncan Smith and Annabel Tapley-Smith have bought the business which has been providing Havelock North's meat goods for 92 years.
"We had been coming up hereto markets for a while and people would always ask when we were going to move up here or open a store," Tapley- Smith said.
"To be able to make the move has been great but to have this space come available and to carry on the great work Paul (Greaney) has done and also be part of the long history this place has is very exciting for us."
Previous owner Paul Greaney ran The Village Butcher for eight years. In 2013 he took out the Supreme Award at the Devro New Zealand Sausage Competition.
"I started the store in 2012 and back then it really wasn't in a good shape and I had to work hard to get it where it is and now I wand to slow down a bit and spend more time with my family," Greaney said.
"The main thing I wanted for the business was for it to reach its centenary and when Duncan and Annabelle came along I knew it would be going into the right hands."
He is still planning to continue his work with his home kill butchery as well as continuing to build his food box business, On Your Plate along, with business partner Kate Lester.
The Smiths started Waipawa Butchery two years ago with all the beef and lamb produced and sold all coming from their farm Patangata Station in the Tukituki Valley in Central Hawke's Bay.
Annabel Tapley-Smith and Duncan Smith produce all their beef and lamb from Patangata Station with the Waipawa store 15km away and their new Havelock North store 35km away. Photo / Warren Buckland
They have always wanted to keep a small set up with all the meat coming from their farm, with their Waipawa store 15km away and their new Havelock North store 35km away, they don't plan on expanding too much but wanted to bring their production closer to the hub of Hawke's Bay.
"We would come up for markets and people would come along and get hooked and always ask when we were making the move up, we even had people travelling all over the place to come buy some meat, from Napier and Hastings and even people coming from the Manawatu just to buy meat," Tapley- Smith said.
Their animals are fed a mix of 100 per cent fresh grass and nutrient-rich green plants which they thrive on, producing hormone free meat.
But apart from selling their own produced meat they supply a range of local products such as Bostock chicken and also look to pay homage to the butchery's history by continuing to sell Greaney's award winning pork sausages, which will still be available in their Havelock North store.
"I gave them a few of my recipes, ones that were popular to the locals, and they plan to keep them going," Greaney said.
"I'm quite looking forward to being able to go down and buy some of my sausages rather then making them myself."
But with all the popularity around the butchery the Smith's still don't have any plans to make any big expansions.
