Introduce yourself.
I'm Darren, CEO of Treat Yo Self a family owned and run plant based gourmet confectionery company based in Meath.
What inspired you to join the natural health sector?
Nearly every sweet on the shelf has gelatine or some animal by-product in it, which quietly locks a huge number of people out: anyone vegan, anyone who avoids gelatine for their own reasons, whole groups who’ve struggled to enjoy confectionery. We wanted to build the opposite, a treat that's completely free of gelatine and animal by-products, so it's genuinely inclusive. The goal from day one has been a sweet you can pick up without a second thought and without compromise. That's where we sit in a shop like Evergreen: not as a health food but as an inclusive treat when its time to Treat Yo Self.
Where did you get the idea for your brand?
As a plant-based family back in 2020, we struggled like a lot of people to find treats we could actually enjoy, there just wasn't much available here, so we ended up importing better quality sweets from Europe just to have something in the press. Then lockdown hit, and our then eight year old, Harry, had his heart set on a gaming PC. With plenty of time on our hands, we helped him start Treat Yo Self as a direct-to-consumer brand to earn it, and it took off far beyond a gaming PC. Three years in we began listing with retailers, and today we're stocked in over 250 stores nationwide.
What makes your brand unique?
We’re a family owned gourmet plant-based confectionery company and all three of those phrases matter. Gourmet, because these aren't an afterthought product; the quality and the taste have to stand up against anything on the shelf. Plant-based, because everything is fully free of gelatine and animal by-products, so nobody gets left out. And we're proudly family-owned a challenger brand that started as a hobby project and now sits in some of the biggest stores nationwide.
What are your company’s core values?
Everything we do comes back to kindness to the planet, the earth and animals. Kindness to animals is the whole foundation: every sweet is plant-based, free of gelatine and animal by products, so no creature is part of the treat. Kindness to the earth shapes how we make and pack it. We’re an eco-friendly brand, we put real thought into earth-friendly packaging, and we plant a tree through One Tree Planted to give back to the planet that gives us so much. And running underneath all of it is being proudly, family-run Irish supporting local, championing Irish enterprise, and proving a small family brand can do the right thing and still make sweets people genuinely love.
How do you support your community?
We regularly donate treats to local clubs, schools, Fundraisers & Charities. Including CHI Temple St, Crumlin and Make A Wish.
What has been the most rewarding part of your brands journey?
Honestly, it's what it's done for us as a family. It's given us time together, building something side by side, that we all care about. It's let us teach the kids the things that actually matter: a proper work ethic, where food comes from, kindness to animals and the planet, and the value of seeing a hard idea all the way through. Watching them grow with an idea that started with them, to now being stocked nationwide and building a brand that's recognisable by so many.
What in your opinion makes Irish brands unique?
For me it comes down to authenticity and sweat equity. Irish brands tend to be the real thing, usually a family or a small team who've poured themselves into it, not a marketing exercise dreamed up in a boardroom. There's a work ethic here that you can taste in the product; because it's a small country and a small market, you can't cut corners or hide behind scale, so the quality has to be genuinely excellent to earn its place. You're buying something that people have actually sweated over and stand over personally and I think shoppers feel that difference, even if they can't always put their finger on why.
What is your favourite product from your brand?
It has to be our Share Pouches. The name says it all 800g of sweets designed to be shared, a way of bringing people together around a moment. That's what I love about them: they're not really about the sweets, they're about the occasion. A pouch passed around on a family day out, thrown in the bag for the holidays, handed over as a gift, or opened at the end of a day that felt like a storm just to bring a bit of calm and joy back. They're built for all those moments and plenty more.
Tell us about something that has shaped your brand?
A big one for us has been the drive to stand out. In a category full of huge corporations worth billions, we wanted packaging that genuinely pops, bold colours that catch your eye on a shelf from across the shop and make you want to pick it up. But that only works if what's inside lives up to it. So the standard we set ourselves is simple: draw people in with the look, then make sure the taste never disappoints once they open it. That push to be eye-catching on the outside and excellent on the inside has shaped everything.
What do you hope to accomplish in the future?
The dream is to take Treat Yo Self global. We've already had a taste of it, being featured in Global Travel Retail Magazine as an example of where confectionery is heading was a real signal that there's an appetite for what we do well beyond Ireland. So the goal is international expansion in a big way: duty free zones around the world, our pouches in the trolley on aeroplanes, and on shelves everywhere from as close as the UK to as far as Australia. For a family brand that started as a kid's project in lockdown, being something travellers pick up all over the world would be some story and that's exactly the one we're chasing.
