Why Pip Murray is taking Pip & Nut beyond nut butter

Pip & Nut is famed for taking on the giants of peanut butter. Now the clean-label brand – led by Grocer Gold winner Pip Murray – is setting its sights on Nutella.

Last weekend, Pip & Nut launched its Chocolate Hazelnut Spread into Sainsbury’s. It comprises 39.2% Californian almonds, 24% hazelnuts and 7% cocoa mass from Tony’s Open Chain. The “rich, indulgent” spread contains 9.1g sugar per 100g – less than one-sixth of the amount in Nutella (56.3g). “It’s a really nutty, quite punchy flavour,” says Murray.

For Nutella lovers, some elements could take a bit of getting used to. The spread doesn’t contain palm oil or emulsifiers, meaning it is prone to “a little bit” of separation. But “there’s no reason” why Pip & Nut can’t lead a transformation of the chocolate spread category, Murray believes. “It just comes back to having a really nice product. It has to taste really good and have a clear USP.”

Those credentials are vital, given the price premium at play. A 165g jar of Pip & Nut’s Chocolate Hazelnut Spread costs £3.50 in Sainsbury’s. Nutella charges less for more than twice the amount – a 350g jar cost £3.18 at the time of writing.

“That’s the challenge we’ll have to face,” admits Murray. “Are people willing to pay that little bit more for something that is ethical, that’s healthier, that’s still delicious, but is a little bit more expensive as a result? We have a case study to say that they will, because we’ve seen it in nut butter.”

Indeed, Pip & Nut’s original product has enjoyed rapid success. It all started in 2013, when Murray cooked up a clean-label recipe to fuel her marathon training. Two years later, Murray had sold out at London’s Maltby Street Market – and left her job to focus on the brand.

A decade on and Pip & Nut is the second top-selling nut butter brand in Britain, with value sales of its nut butters reaching £20.7m. It’s recently overtaken Sun-Pat (£14.1m) and Meridian (£19.3m) [NIQ 52 w/e 17 May 2025].

There’s still a £6m gap to bridge before it catches category leader Whole Earth (£26.8m), but Pip & Nut is enjoying encouraging value growth of 31.3%.

“It’s all started to really come together in the last couple of years,” Murray says. “The growth has been phenomenal. When I launched, people said: ‘Nobody’s going to accept a product that separates. It’s messy; it’s unsightly.’ Look at the category now.”

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As she points out, the palm oil that stops that separation is increasingly an off-putting feature, rather than a selling point. Whole Earth and Sun-Pat, both of which use palm oil as a stabiliser, are declining by 10.0% and 13.4% respectively as sustainability concerns grow. Meanwhile, Pip & Nut is enjoying double-digit gains, alongside fellow palm oil free brand Meridian, up 13.6%.

Now Murray is looking to maintain that momentum by bolstering Pip & Nut’s snacking portfolio. The lineup already includes chocolate nut butter cups, launched in 2019 and rebooted last summer to use cocoa from Tony’s Open Chain. The brand also unveiled peanut butter-stuffed oat bars last July.

“We’ve got big bits of innovation launching in autumn,” Murray reveals. “About 20% of our business will be made up of snacking this year… and I think by the end of next year, it will make up about a third.”

Scaling challenges

Murray’s optimistic outlook has helped her navigate the challenges of scaling a brand. For instance, she recently posted on LinkedIn about her experience of a retailer delisting selected products.

“I was pissed off at first (it’s hard not to take it personally),” Murray wrote. “But I’ve learned … don’t dwell, channel that energy.”

While Murray didn’t name the retailer, several Pip & Nut lines disappeared from Asda in April [Assosia]. The post clearly struck a chord, reaching “about half a million people”. This is because delists are “something that doesn’t get spoken about,” says Murray.

Murray decided to post to “tell the honest truth about what happens in retail”, while modelling “resilience” to fellow founders. “It’s quite difficult when you get news like that… You have to think: how are you going to deal with that as a team and as an individual?”

The value Murray places on her team is evident at Pip & Nut’s London HQ, also known as The Nest. Located in a former warehouse in Shoreditch, the space is full of natural light and plants.

Murray says she wants to “signal to people that this is a place where you can come and actually be accepted”. As such, all Pip & Nut job ads feature a prompt encouraging women and people from minority backgrounds to apply, even if they don’t have “100% of the skills”.

The business has also stopped incentivising referrals from existing employees to avoid nepotism. “There’s loads of things we’re doing to level the playing field.”

Murray is, of course, a staunch advocate for business with purpose. In 2023, she joined the B Lab UK board of trustees. Last year, she co-founded Jedi Matters – a collective with a vision to use the power of SMEs to deliver a more Just, Equitable, Diverse & Inclusive society.

“Ultimately, your business will be stronger if you have more diversity of thought. And if people feel that they truly belong in an organisation, as opposed to feeling isolated, you will get more from your team.”

Getting the most out of her team will be essential for Pip & Nut’s next stage of growth. “People say £17m+ RSV is a big tipping point, where you get growing pains, and you need to think differently,” says Murray.

In anticipation of that challenge, Pip & Nut last year appointed lead investor Giles Brook as chairman. She also hired two non-executive directors: Mindful Chef CEO Tim Lee and Vita Coco CMO Jane Prior.

“Having good people around that table felt like a next natural step as we’re growing up,” says Murray. And they could just put the frighteners on Nutella.