In 2018, Nick and Kelly Fox purchased the salami brand, Basecamp. We spoke to them about their business and future endeavours.
What is your company background, how did you start the business?
Basecamp Salamis started 30 years ago producing smoked venison salami and selling at markets throughout New Zealand. In 2018, Nick and Kelly Fox purchased Basecamp. Nick is a qualified butcher and he worked and managed basecamp for around 8 years prior to having the opportunity to purchase Basecamp in 2018. The reason for us in purchasing Basecamp was about quality, we believe in our products and want to provide traditionally made smoked products to our customers. Many salami products are now bulk manufactured using boiling techniques to speed up the manufacturing process, at Basecamp we are passionate about providing high quality, hand-produced product to our retail market. Basecamp is not only about selling salamis to the public. We also provide a full butchery service for hunters, lifestyle block owners and farmers including our smoked smallgoods and salamis. Nick’s philosophy is about “feeding the family”, he utilises all parts of the animal for our customers. Basecamp is an MPI Duel Operator certified business.
What is the current product range and variants and how do these products stand out in the market?
Our retail product range includes Venison Smoked Salami: Wild game with juniper berry and nutmeg, an earthy mild salami that lets the venison shine through. Garlic, Pepperoni, Chilli and Red Wine Cracked Pepper. We also produce smoked small goods - Wild Game, Chorizo (Chilli) and Garlic Smoked Sausage, and Garlic and Pepperoni Biersticks. Our products are well known around New Zealand. They stand out from many other products as we hand produce and naturally wood smoke, the manufacturing process takes three days. Because we wood smoke our salamis, they improve with age as traditional European salamis do. Our salamis and smoked small goods are made from wild, free-range venison and hand-mixed ingredients with no added fillers, and are gluten, dairy and soy-free. Our salami and smoked sausage products contain only 8% pork fat which is needed as venison is a very lean healthy meat and this is the one area that our product differs from traditional salami which can be high in fat. Our biersticks do not contact any pork fat so are perfect for those people that do not eat pork and is a very low-fat option. For our meat processing side of the business, Nick has expanded the butchery services and range. As an avid hunter, his passion lies with providing for his family.
Has there been any recent company news?
The most recent company news has been our taking ownership of Basecamp from the previous owners who started the business nearly 30 years ago. We have also just launched a new website a couple of months ago. Nick has revamped our Wild Game salami which is proving more popular than ever. We will be rebranding this name to Juniper very soon to be more in line with our other salami names. Nick is in the process of product testing a traditional chorizo smoked sausage. Currently, our chorizo smoked sausage is a smaller version of our chilli salami, but we want to produce an actual chorizo product. We are looking forward to launching this early next year.
What are the plans for the business moving forward, is there any expansion on the horizon?
The plans for the business moving forward is to continue to provide a quality product for both retail and meat processing. We are a small family-owned business and due to the nature of hand producing a quality product, we do not foresee any big expansions. We pride ourselves in our quality and reliability and want to continue providing quality products for our customers.
Where are your products currently available to buy, and are you looking at or wanting to expand your availability? If so, where would you like to see your product situated?
Our retail salamis and smoked goods can be purchased from our online shop at www.basecampsalamis.co.nz. Basecamp products can be found at Kaiwaka Cheese, SH1 in Kaiwaka. We also have several amazing salespeople in the Waikato, Bay of Plenty and Hawkes Bay regions doing local farmers markets, lifestyle expos and food shows. Nick and Kelly can be found each year at the Mystery Creek Fieldays in Hamilton. Going forward, we may look for some additional market teams in other areas of New Zealand to enable more people easy access to our products.
For more information visit www.basecampsalamis.co.nz.
