Aliya's marketing plan finally paying off

DAN LAZIN
Edmonton Journal

Noorudin and Anis Jiwani laugh when they try to count how many samosas they've given away.

Noorudin's laugh is both a laugh of success and a laugh at the sheer ridiculousness of the figures.

"Tens of thousands. Tens and tens of thousands."

The million-dollar promotional effort that accompanied the birth of Aliya's Foods three years ago was, in part, a conventional attempt to get the taste of their Chef Bombay brand of samosas into consumers' mouths.

More than that, though, they were desperate to educate people about the East Indian appetizer.

"There are a lot of people who don't know what a samosa is," laments Jim Lumley, the company's venerable sales and marketing manager. "That's been one of our biggest challenges. If you go to B.C., there's a lot more knowledge, but it's not like that in Alberta." The American market was even less informed.

Samosas are folded triangles of thin pastry filled with spices and vegetables or meat, then fried or baked until crisp.

"It's a virgin food to Alberta," says Anis -- or at least it was a virgin food until Chef Bombay came along. Now Aliya's is producing 25,000 samosas daily; sales are up 300 per cent from last year, and Noorudin says it won't be too long until that initial bout of marketing is paid off and the company breaks even.

Profitability of the samosa line is only step one. The Jiwanis envision a day when Aliya's will provide a full selection of East Indian cuisine, from starters, through entrees to desserts.

Authenticity has taken a small hit; although the chicken and beef samosas are a close match to those available in the East and in Africa, with almost no vegetable filler, the spices had to be toned down for Western palates.

But the samosas are exceptionally well made, folded tightly seven times by the only automated samosa machine in North America. The chicken and beef varieties are almost pure meat. The entrees, which should hit shelves within a year, may end up as a culinary fusion, Noorudin says. The company hasn't decided on a final assortment of dinners.

A selection of desserts should arrive in three to five years, he hopes.

Like the samosas, Aliya's future offerings will likely be made primarily of Alberta ingredients. Except for the eight spices and the meat, almost all the ingredients -- potatoes, carrots, lentils, peas, onions, canola oil -- are grown in-province. The lean beef and chicken breast and thigh meat come from B.C., because Alberta has no federally inspected Halal slaughterhouse. Halal is a method of slaughter that conforms to Muslim beliefs.

With exceptional standards for food safety, Aliya's is a particular standout in the samosa sector.

"Samosas are traditionally made by mom-and-pop shops. We had to get away from that -- we had to mass-produce it, and we had to do it in the right way." From Day 1, the Sherwood Park plant was federally inspected. They met the higher HACCP standard just months later.

Quality, safety -- and thousands of free samples -- got the Chef Bombay brand into every major western-Canada retailer except Superstore, into IGA chains from coast to coast, and into Costco stores across the continent. They're throughout the food-service industry, from bars and hotels and equestrian clubs to jails and airforce bases.

Such wide availability must come as a relief to the risk-takers, who didn't see a sale until the end of three months of freebies. The first sale? To Edmonton's Petroleum Club for $65.

© Copyright 2003 Edmonton Journal