Meet our local partner, Excellent Meat
To deliver quality meat you can trust, we’ve built trusted supply chains with our farmers and suppliers.
We’re proud to tell you the story of our local butchery partner, Excellent Meat. This family-run business was started by husband and wife team, Shafie and Sara Sonday in 1970 in Wetton, Cape Town.
The Sonday's have been in the meat business for over four decades, and their butchery has been run by two generations of family.
Read on to get to know the passionate team behind our premium quality meat.
Humble beginnings
Shafie Sonday borrowed money from his sister to purchase his very first butchery in 1970. An astute businessman, he saw a gap in the market for clean offal (ox tripe, ox trotters and sheep trotters), and approached Maitland Abattoir to supply him with uncleaned offal. He started to clean the offal, but there was not enough time to do it during the day, while running a butchery. He came up with a plan to clean it at night. And through hard work and perseverance, that plan paid off.
The offal business was so profitable that in 1983, he was able to buy another store and by 1990, they were able to start their wholesale meat business. Their business began as Epping Meat Wholesalers and is now called Excellent Meat - to reflect the nature of their product.
The Sonday kids grew up having to count and log the cleaned offal before going to school in the mornings, and none of them were too keen on the task! Nonetheless, they went on to join the company in the mid-1980s, and together they have carried the business to fantastic heights. In 2012, this new generation of family butchers brought Excellent Meat International to life.
Woolies partnership
The first order of meat was delivered to Woolworths in Adderley street in 1996. In 1997, they were able to buy their wholesale facility and started supplying the Woolworths meat plant with ± 300 lambs and 8 tonnes of boneless beef. And by 2013, they were supplying Woolworths with 77 500 kgs of meat.
It has been such a longstanding and successful partnership, that they were able to open butcher counters in Woolworths stores; the same ones customers can approach for information and help, specialized orders and even for cooking tips.
Founder Shafie Sonday, sadly passed away in 2008 - the same year that Excellent Meat opened their very first butcher counter in Woolworths Cavendish.
Excellent people
In 1971, the business only had one employee. Now they're a team of 900. Treating people fairly is at the heart of everything they do, a value the Excellent Meat team shares with Woolies.
Their people work in a safe environment, are well treated and fairly rewarded for their work. And they're every bit as passionate about meat as we are.
Your neighbourhood Butcher
Alfonso Hearne is your friendly Butcher Manager at our V&A Waterfront store. He previously studied IT, while he did casual work at Excellent Meat. He loved his job and the people so much, that he changed paths and is now passionate about his job as a butcher. He started out as a blockman, and worked his way up to becoming Butcher Manager at one of our flagship stores.
He loves interacting with his customers and sharing his knowledge and passion for good quality meat. He is always on hand to advise them on the best cuts and how to cook them.
Alfonso says: “Whatever you do, do it with passion. People don’t always immediately pick up on the premium quality of the meat you present them with, but they can see the passion IN the quality. Putting a smile on a customer’s face is my favourite part of the job.”
Next time you’re in the area, pop in and say "hi" to Alfonso.
The bottom line
So, there you have it. Woolies is partnered with Excellent Meat not only because of their premium quality products, but also because they share our values.