Sometimes in life, things just fall into place as if they were meant to be.

When Ali Brierley, recovering from the break-up of a long-term relationship, went to stay with an old friend in Manchester to take stock of his life he had no idea of what was about to unfold - and where it would lead them both.

It was the beginning of March last year and his friend, Josh Parker, had been studying for a music degree there.

Ali says: ’I got to his flat and the next day the lockdown came. I arrived with a bag with about three days of clothes in it and was stuck there for three and a half months.’

He had spent the previous 10 years in Yorkshire, working as a chef in a range of venues, cooking every style of cuisine, from fish and chips to Michelin starred. He’d also done a few years as a baker.

He says: ’I’ve always been a chef, all my adult life, so I thought: "If I’m going to be here, I’ll do all the cooking".’

Josh at this point had already been vegan for five years so clearly this was what Ali would be cooking.

He says: ’Vegan was something that I had done before, and I’d got a lot of experience with the ingredients. I know what flavours work together so it was quite easy for me to do. People say to me: "How do you cope on a vegan diet?" and I say: "Well it’s quite simple really: you’ve got every single ingredient in the world and all you’ve got to do is take the meat, fish, dairy and eggs out of it".’

Not only was Josh living like a king with Ali’s cooking, he also realised that he might have found the ideal opportunity to pitch a business idea to his friend, for an artisan business selling vegan food.

Josh says: ’I’d had this idea for a few years but I knew I couldn’t do it alone. My expertise is in sales and customer service. I knew Ali was more than capable and I sold him, not just on this idea but on this beautiful island we live on as well, moving over here to live.

’It was just perfect timing.

’I knew there was a gap in the market here because in Manchester there are so many options for vegans it was just everywhere you go there’s amazing places you can eat.’

They arrived in the island in July 2020 and by February this year they were ready to launch Veg and Vitality, selling their products through their website. A third lockdown, which followed shortly after, meant that their model based on online ordering and doorstep delivery became popular very quickly.

Josh says: ’It was very busy during lockdown. It turned out to be a great time for us to start.’

Ali agrees: ’People say: "How did you start a business in Covid?" If anything it helped us. People began to be more health conscious, to explore more. You had more time to sit and think about it: what am I doing with my life how can I help improve it?

’And you get great support here: it’s a small community and everybody just sort of bands together. If they see somebody trying to make a go of it you tend to get a lot of support.’

They worked very closely with DEFA to develop products using as many Manx ingredients as possible.

’We’ve had a lot of help from DEFA it’s been fantastic: grants and we’ve also had help to get accredited [with the Manx provenance label]. Every single one of our products is accredited as made in the Isle of Man, which is obviously massive for us, especially when we start exporting down the line,’ says Ali.

’We couldn’t have asked for any more help,’ agrees Josh.

Clearly not every ingredient can be Manx but Ali says: ’The things that we use very regularly are local. All our flour is from Laxey Flour Mills; all the rapeseed oil that we use in the pastry, the dressings and the hummus, is grown and bottled at Ellerslie Farm; our herbs we get from Staarvey Farm, and we get our produce from Robinson’s.

’If it’s not grown or produced in the island and has to be shipped we tend to use a local supplier to get it. Even the packaging we use is from MannVend.’

They are working on making every element of their packaging eco-friendly, recyclable or compostable or a combination and they hope to have achieved this within the next six months.

As the island opened up and people had more shopping options it became clear that they needed to change their business model.

Josh says: ’When the lockdowns started to ease we realised that just delivering alone wouldn’t be enough so we knew it was time to approach Shoprite because we had a good model there at that point, we were a proven popular product.’

When Shoprite agreed to give them a trial, Ali was still cooking everything himself in his kitchen at home. He says: ’As the work increased we realised that we needed a facility quite quickly, and other employees - a bit of help.’

The opportunity to rent a unit at Balthane came up and ’we grabbed it straightaway’.

It was as well that they did: the trial with Shoprite went well with a good response to their products and the pace really started to pick up. Josh says: ’Shoprite have been amazing: they’ve really helped push us and promote us on their Facebook pages and now we’re in most of the stores.

’We’ve also been in Robinsons at Ballapaddag for a couple of months now and it’s going really well there.’

They reckon their best-selling products are their brownies, the arancini (made with wild mushrooms and butternut squash), the mushroom and red wine gravy pie and the hummus.

Their sushi rolls are also proving popular.

Josh says: ’When we first made them we couldn’t believe it - they taste so much like sushi.’

They are made with rice and nori but use vegetables, garlic and oyster mushrooms instead of raw fish and they pack a big flavour punch.

They are currently working on developing a pesto pasta salad and a gluten free range which they say a lot of people have been asking for.

But they have even bigger plans in the works for the future. They want to start exporting their products.

Ali says: ’As soon as we fill the market here and build up to the point where we can start pushing on, that’s where we’re going.’

Having ridden the upsurge in popularity in veganism over the last few years raises the obvious question of how long this can continue to fuel growth in their business. In the end it probably won’t matter: these are locally made products and, on those days you don’t fancy cooking yourself, they are tasty enough even for the meat lovers to enjoy.

Especially the arancini...