ABOUT US
The story of Spitskop Botter is a story of pioneering work and dedication which started on the farm Voetpad near Murraysburg in the Karoo in 1935. It is also characteristic of the Slabbert family’s distinguishing attributes of ingenuity, inventiveness and perseverance while cultivating the land, their strong family bond, love for their fellowmen, and an inborn desire to uphold tradition while sharing with others the good that life gives to them.
The early days
As the wife of a successful farmer in the Karoo, Maruis’s grandmother – Helena Slabbert – established a successful
butter-making farm industry on Voetpad in the 1930s. With the milk from the farm’s large Jersey stud readily available, she managed to produce up to 100 pounds (that is 45 kg!) of butter per week.
Mariëtte – Maruis’s mother – married Oupa Chris and Ouma Helena’s son – Johannes – in 1958 and settled with him on the farm Zeekoegat near the historical village of Nieu- Bethesda. Inspired by her mother-in-law, she soon decided to also make butter, rather than merely delivering their cream to Chelsey Dairies in Port Elizabeth as they were doing at the time.
(Delivery, by the way, was done by road and railway over a distance of 350 km, with the South African Railways bus collecting the cream, kept in purpose-made cream cans, from the farm. The same bus also transported the butter Mariëtte made to the nearby town of Graaff-Reinet – a distance of around 100 km. Important to point out, the transportation was done without refrigeration or cold chain facilities available at the time. The butter was of such a high quality, though, that it remained fresh while in transit!)
Under Helena’s careful, dedicated (and in all probability, strict!) guidance, Mariëtte established herself as a butter maker
of note, having set her facilities up in exactly the same way Helena has done, although on a slightly smaller scale. As their Jersey livestock increased in numbers, she managed to produce up to 40 pounds (18 kg) of butter per week.
Fast forward to 2017!
Maruis, in 2017, decided it was time to rekindle the family tradition of making butter. He collected from storage on the farm the original equipment – mainly made from wood which is the best material for producing butter – and set it up as a home industry where he lives. Where necessary, he added a modernised touch to ensure improved efficiency and a hygienic facility.
Being the perfectionist he is, Maruis also chose an appropriate name for his butter, and created a professional and striking brand image for the product. To round things off, he selected high-quality, printed wrapping paper and distinct presentation packaging to create a gratifying customer experience when receiving and opening the product.
With the hands-on butter-making experience he gained while growing up on the farm still fresh in his mind, and with Mariëtte’s tuition available when it was needed, Spitskop Botter soon became a reality, with Maruis now producing more than 100 blocks of butter over weekends! With this came the fulfilment of a third generation in the Slabbert family being able to continue the tradition of this fine craft. Perhaps even more important, it also brought Maruis the joy and satisfaction of being able to present this exceptional product in a heartfelt way to a discerning market.
“You do not have to dream big to make a success of something which someone else has started many years ago,” says Maruis as he summarises this journey which reads like a fantasy. “You only have to hold on to your heritage. Tradition will pull it through.”
And being a third generation Slabbert who relies on tradition to make things work for him, one starts to understand the driving force behind his success. It also explains why his customers, in an affectionate way, now refer to Maruis as “Die Botterman!”
