Posh popcorn brand Propercorn is Europe’s fifth fastest growing company of 1,000 according to the Financial Times and the UK’s bestselling gourmet popcorn brand. Since launching in 2011, the brand has gone from, a tiny company with no marketing budget, to a business with a strong presence in twelve European countries!
The London-based company has certainly come a long way since Greek Cypriot founder Cassandra Stavrou, then working in advertising, noticed that her colleagues were always hit by a mid-afternoon slump.
“Everyone wanted a snack but all that was on offer was a rice cake, which is bland and boring, or a chocolate bar that’s unhealthy,” she said in an interview.
“I noticed an opportunity for a snack that was tasty and good for you, and I felt popcorn would be a good vehicle to do that.”
She believes fate played a role too: “My father was a hopeless cook, but made the best popcorn. Together, we’d spend hours experimenting with ingredients and seasonings, impatiently waiting for each kernel to pop, so that we could try out our latest recipe. He passed away when I was 16, and the last present he bought me was a popcorn machine. I still had it in the box and felt that was a nice extra bit of conviction I needed.”
Using these precious memories, Cassandra created PROPERCORN with her best friend and business partner, Ryan Kohn. “ We have taken great pride in our popcorn, making sure that every pack is both delicious and guilt-free. There shouldn’t have to be a compromise,” she said. “Done Properly” extends far beyond our popcorn. It is our approach to everything we do. Whether we’re designing new packaging, curating our own events or collaborating with artists, our energetic team is always looking to create, in a way that we’re excited by and passionate about.”
In 2009, aged 26, Cassandra quit her job and moved back in with her mum in London, helped by a deep-rooted entrepreneurial spirit.
“I always knew I wanted to run my own business from a young age,” she says.
By working in pubs in the evenings and at weekends, as well as undertaking painting commissions, she managed to scrape together a £10,000 start-up fund.
However, she was surprised by how long it took to launch the brand. “What I thought I could achieve in six months took a lot longer,” she admits.
Cassandra’s determination to make sure her popcorn was healthy but still tasty was the issue. It meant she had to come up with a way to get the flavouring to stick to the corn without covering it in oil. In the end, she came up with the idea of spraying the corn with a car spray gun to cover it in a really fine mist of rapeseed oil, and then “tumbling” the corn in a cement mixer with the flavouring to give it an even coverage.
But it took almost a year to find a UK manufacturer able to make it in the way she wanted.
It was around this stage of the business that Ryan came on board as co-founder and together they launched Propercorn with four flavours including Sweet & Salty and Sour Cream & Chive in October 2011.
Within six months two private individuals invested in the company, resulting in them, together with Ryan’s mother who also invested, owning just under 20% of Propercorn, with the co-founders retaining the rest.
Propercorn’s first customer was the cafe at Google’s London office before winning over London department store Selfridges. The brand now shifts three million bags a month!
“We do have a long-term vision for the business,” says Ryan. “We’re hell-bent on making Propercorn the number one global snack brand, and we’re reinvesting in a big way to achieve that.”
