NASA technology and the Transcarpathian sun”. Ukrainians have created a unique brand of cheese treats, snEco

Brothers Pylyp and Vadym Gryshyn from Kharkiv founded their first business while they were still students: they developed bead embroidery kits. Today, AbrisArt needlework kits are sold on four continents. But the brothers wanted to take on something unusual, something that no one in Ukraine had ever done before.

After two years of experiments and hundreds of kilograms of spoiled cheese, the brothers presented a unique treat: cheese you can crunch. This is what happens when a rock musician meets technology developed by NASA! 

Because of the Russian invasion, snEco moved its production from Kharkiv to Mukachevo. At the new site, the Transcarpathian sun and new employees from all over Ukraine help to make the space snacks.

It all started in 2015. My brother Vadym and I already had a joint business back then, AbrisArt, a company that makes embroidery kits. Things were going quite well, and at some point we realised that we had the spare money, hands and brains to try another business project. We wanted to try our hand at something completely different, and we were looking for an idea that would excite us ourselves. We travelled to various countries and took an interest in completely different industries. For example, we thought about bringing hydroponic greenhouses from Israel to Ukraine and getting into modern vegetable growing. But it didn't work out.

In 2016, Vadym and I decided to create a product that would meet the needs of today's young people: something nutritious and free of chemicals, something you could add to your soup during a quick office lunch, toss into a salad, or enjoy with a glass of wine or beer. We won't pretend: the idea of cheese snacks is not new, and it isn't ours. We first tasted something similar in the USA. We liked it, but back then, just like some of our customers today, we had our doubts: is this really cheese? Is there really nothing but cheese in it? We wanted to make something similar in Ukraine.

Hundreds of kilograms of spoiled cheese and NASA technology

It took us two years to make cheese bites that we could present to the public. Two years of experiments, of searching for drying methods and even for the ideal cheeses for it. Then came all sorts of improvements, and this process continues to this day.

How do we turn hard cheese into crunchy, light bites? Thanks to microwave vacuum drying technology. This technology was actually invented by NASA so that food for astronauts in orbit would weigh little while retaining a high energy value. 

So it really is space technology! But before we found the right equipment and set up the production process, we spoiled hundreds of kilograms of cheese over 2 years… Sometimes we got big lumps, sometimes “loaves”, and sometimes the cheese merged into one solid slab. It was very exciting and interesting, if costly. And by the end of 2017 we had our first perfect cheese bites, and a year later we reached an annual turnover of UAH 3 million. That year the company produced 70 thousand packs of dried cheese, or 2 million cheese bites.

The CEO of a cheese company bought up all our snacks at a petrol station

And just when we had started developing our own brand, we were approached by Bel Shostka Ukraine (better known for its brand “Vesela Korivka”). It's a story straight out of a film: the company's CEO saw our cheese bites at an OKKO petrol station, tasted them and bought up everything in stock so that he could taste them more carefully and figure out what kind of product it was.

Later, the company asked us to make cheese snacks for them. We spent six months renovating to build our production to their standards: we had to meet not only Ukrainian but also European standards. We managed it, and our first snacks were made for the French company Groupe Bel. A year and a half later they left the Ukrainian market, but by then we knew for sure that our product was in demand and of high quality. And that pushed us to create our own brand, snEco, by Prime Snack LLC.

Something for beer and something for dieters

We now have 12 kinds of snacks made from 12 different cheeses. The range covers the widest variety of needs: we have fitness snacks, kids' snacks and snacks to go with alcoholic drinks. For example, the Sulguni snack goes with beer, and the Parmesan snack pairs perfectly with wine.

We work with Ukrainian cheeses and also order from abroad. For instance, we import Gouda from Germany and Goya Parmesan from the Netherlands, while our classic snack range is made from the Ukrainian cheese “Stolychnyi” by the Tulchynka brand. And “Gratsiia” cheese by the Pyriatyn brand is the basis of our Fitness range, because it belongs to the reduced-fat cheese category. 

Our product is completely natural cheese. That is, we take good factory-made blocks of cheese, cut them… a little magic, and we have delicious, crunchy cheese bites. Besides the bites, there are also crunchy cheese sticks, snacks made from Sulguni cheese. Our sticks come in two flavours, pepper and garlic, and everything is natural too, no E-numbers!

There's even a patent on the packaging

We have a patent confirming that during snack production and drying we add absolutely nothing to the cheese. That is, it's pure milk: we leave the cheese exactly as it was made from the milk and only remove the moisture. Importantly, we dry the cheeses at a low temperature, 30-32 °C, because at higher temperatures the fat starts to melt and it simply cannot be dried. 100 g of cheese yields 40 g of crunchy snacks.

Our technology is unique; it's even better than the one used in the USA. We add absolutely nothing to the cheese: no vegetable fats, preservatives, colourings, starches, anti-caking or anti-clumping agents, flavourings or flavour imitators. The only things we add are natural pepper and garlic, and only in certain snack lines.

Usually the first reaction to our product goes like this: “Hmm… You're not telling us something, this can't just be cheese! And if it is cheese, how does it keep without a fridge for 2 years?” They taste it. “Oh, it really is like Gouda, and this one is like Parmesan…”.

Today we hold two Ukrainian patents. The first is for drying cheese without additives, the second for applying natural (I stress this!) flavourings to dried cheeses. It really is a healthy and nutritious snack. Another feature of our snacks that we are very proud of: in its original packaging (which we also hold a patent for), our dried cheese can keep for up to 2 years. And it doesn't need any special conditions.

The next “bang” could be right next to you

I took my family out of Kharkiv as soon as the invasion began. Two small children, a pregnant wife. There was no other option. The constant shelling: bangs everywhere, and you realise that the next “bang” could be right next to you. You watch the news: that's my school, the school I went to, my school! And it's full of holes… Destroyed. Our house is practically gone too; the neighbours sent photos. Our father lived under occupation for three weeks. It's very hard. But you can't fall apart. You have to take care of your family, get the business going and help the country.  

I believe we have only two options: either be at the front, or work every day, seven days a week, for Ukraine's economy. For now we are doing the latter. On 25-26 February we transferred all the funds we had in our accounts to the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the Come Back Alive foundation, split equally. In total it came to about UAH 500,000. We didn't know what would happen to us or whether Kharkiv would hold out. But we wanted to do everything we could to help our country.

For the first months we couldn't even retrieve our company seals

For the first two months of the full-scale invasion we could neither work nor even take out our equipment or documents. Our office premises were immediately allocated to the needs of the Territorial Defence Forces, and later the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and there was no access at all. We couldn't even retrieve our company seals. The production premises belonged to Ukrzaliznytsia (Ukrainian Railways), so they had restricted-access status, and it took us a very long time to collect all the permits to get in and take anything out. We got permission for a short window of time and took whatever we managed to. We moved it to Mukachevo.

Today many new people work with us. To be honest, when we review CVs, we give preference to internally displaced people and always invite them to a follow-up interview. Because we are displaced people ourselves, we know what it's like to suddenly move to another region without a job, a home or friends there.

We have a mobilisation deferment from the Ministry of Economy

The Diia portal described how businesses could obtain a mobilisation deferment for their employees from the Ministry of Economy. We applied straight away, setting out what kind of company we are, what we do, what plans we already have and why we should be left to work rather than sent to the front. We showed how we had worked before 24 February, and we received a positive answer: you will keep working. I want to say that for us this is not an excuse or anything like that; for us it is a responsibility that the state places on us. And we are doing everything to justify that trust.

I believe our company is very important for Ukraine's economy. Of course, we are not a steel plant or an agricultural holding, but we make a product that is unique not only for Ukraine but also for the European market.

We were offered relocation to Europe, but we declined

It's important for us to work in Ukraine specifically. The thing is, when we had only just started evacuating our equipment from Kharkiv, our European partners suggested that we relocate straight to them: “Come to us, we'll help you set up, you'll make your snacks here, everything will be great!” We didn't go for it. My brother and I unanimously decided that we would not go anywhere, that we wanted to work on our native soil.

What is happening in my country right now is the greatest motivation to work. Everyone fights on their own front. There is the military front, and there is the economic front. We are holding the economic one. Yes, we are still a small business, not even medium-sized. But! I believe that if there are many such businesses, if all of them, small and large, keep working despite the war, we will rebuild the economy even before the war ends.

In Mukachevo we switched to solar energy

Solar panels are a project we had dreamed about for a long time, and we made it happen right here in Transcarpathia. This region seems made for drawing energy from renewable sources. Kharkiv and the Kharkiv region don't get as much sun, so it wasn't economically viable for us there. When we moved to Mukachevo, we saw solar panels on many buildings. And we thought: why don't we do the same?

Especially since it fits our values and our wish to make truly eco-friendly snacks. And, of course, it's a significant saving. Unfortunately, after relocating we had no spare funds left at all to carry out this idea. So we found international organisations that give grants for such projects, applied and explained in detail why we needed solar panels and how we would use them. And for two weeks now, snEco has been drying cheeses with solar energy!

When the weather is sunny, these panels fully cover our electricity needs. When it's cloudy, we take a little from the grid, but it's still a very significant saving of both our money and Ukraine's electricity, which is especially relevant now. So these days we joke that the Transcarpathian sun and NASA technology are working for us.

Soon snEco will be on European shelves

Our top priority is to start exporting. That's what we are betting heavily on right now. We are opening a Prime Snack representative office in Warsaw. By the way, there is already a Diia office in Warsaw, and they help us a lot with everything. To export, we need two permits: a Ukrainian one allowing us to start exporting, and a European one allowing us to bring our products in there.

In the summer we took part in Warsaw Food Expo and presented our cheese snacks. Right now my brother and business partner Vadym is holding talks in Warsaw and signing contracts to export snEco products to Poland. We are delighted that the product now made in Mukachevo will soon be on European shelves. And every pack and box will carry the words “Made in Ukraine”.

Next on our plan is obtaining an operating permit so that we can apply for inclusion in the list of exporters to Europe. There is a separate list for products of animal origin, and it's very hard to get onto. But we are confident that we will succeed and that another great Ukrainian product will soon conquer world markets.

My son was born here, in Mukachevo. He is my third child, and I dream that my children will grow up as Ukrainians who love their country and are proud of it, its unbroken spirit and its freedom. And that will depend not only on their upbringing but also on what I myself do for my country today, tomorrow and the day after.

Article: https://shotam.info/tekhnolohii-nasa-ta-zakarpatske-sontse-ukraintsi-stvoryly-unikalnyy-brend-syrnykh-smakolykiv-sneco/