A LLANDYRNOG butchers established in the 1970s has been nominated for a Welsh rural business award.

Clwyd Williams Butchers has been nominated by the public for the Countryside Alliance Awards (CAA), the rural business awards for Wales.

The village business, which moved from Ruthin to Llandyrnog more than four decades ago, has been nominated in the butchers category for such establishments that represent ‘a positive story about rural life while championing local food and drink’.

The CAA receives thousands of anonymous nominations from the public that are then shortlisted for its regional competitions, after which the winners are invited to the Houses of Parliament for national finals in the presence of MPs and ministers.

Brothers John and Daniel Jones, aged 31 and 22, took over from well-known former owner Clwyd Williams three years ago and say they have “enjoyed every minute of it”.

Daniel said: “Clwyd wanted to retire and with not much interest from anyone to take over we decided to take a gamble and take over the butchers. He stayed on to help with the transition of the business and taught me a lot in a short space of time while I was also lucky enough that Helen (part-time butcher) agreed to stay on with the running of the shop.

“It was a great feeling and I was honoured to be nominated for the awards. It just shows customers appreciate what we are doing at the shop and all the hard work that goes in to it

“There is so much more we want to improve and bring to the shop. This will all come in time.”

Daniel has already had success this year when he was crowned Young Sausage Maker of the Year for north Wales and Cheshire, winning with his pork, pear and honey sausages.

His older brother John said: “We are lucky in Llandyrnog to have a Post Office Shop and a selection of pubs to choose from so we thought it would have been a shame for the village if the shop closed so decided to give it a go. There are not many traditional family butchers about and numbers in the UK seem to be dropping. If supermarkets had their way then there wouldn’t be any.

“As soon as we took over the shop, we said we were going to keep everything local where possible. We source our beef and lamb from local farms or markets and pork comes from Berwyn Jones up the road in Gellifor.

“We are lucky to have great customers who support us and a pool of helpers, family and friends who help out in and around the shop. Without all this we wouldn’t be where we are today.”