I’m Owen and together with my wife Tanya we run Myrddin Heritage in Llandysul, West Wales.
Our journey began in 2013, when Tanya bought me two pet pigs for my 23rd birthday. A couple of years later, in 2015, we decided that office jobs definitely weren’t for us, and we wanted to pursue a career in pig farming because we’d grown to love the animals so much.
Neither of us came from farming backgrounds or had any knowledge of farming – we definitely considered ourselves ‘townies’! – so we jetted off to Australia to gain experience on pig farms down under.
We learnt everything in Aus: from fencing, to how to breed and look after pigs, and how to produce pork and sell the products.
We returned home to Wales in 2017, armed with a plan and a passion to turn our dream into a reality. For us, there was no turning back.
We found a small holding here in Ceredigion and started our business. We now rear a variety of free range, slow-growing Saddleback pigs – a traditional breed which does really well outside.
Our vision was to use natural ingredients and ensure everything was free of preservatives. For us, the most important thing is ensuring we keep to the old traditions, which is hand-making our products at our home premises and using natural ingredients.
But we also try to show what happens behind the scenes via social media, because I think it is important that customers can see where their food comes from.
In Wales we import about 95% of our pork products, so we need to grow and support our local porc producers. The quality of porc across Wales is very high, and the majority of the producers are small like Tanya and me, and keep their pigs outside.
Only 40% of pigs in the UK are kept outside, but for us that is absolutely vital: for the animal, and because outdoor reared meat just tastes so much better, in my opinion.
Since the pandemic we have had to change the way we work, as we used to sell to restaurants but we have now set up Myrddin Heritage & Friends online and we have taken on two employees.
Back in March 2020 Tanya developed our new website in the first week of the first lockdown, and from then we saw the business grow and grow. Now we have over 1,300 online customers; we are very lucky to be so busy. Our delivery day is Friday and we have to start at 3am to get all the orders packed and sent out!
But we enjoy it all, and most importantly we enjoy spending time outside with the pigs. Every week is a challenge, but it’s all good!
