It was all started by a mouse

Writer: Elaine Davie.

If Mickey thought of himself as the world’s most famous mouse, in this neck of the woods another mouse runs him a close second. It is Pringle Bay’s Ticklemouse. Many of us will have seen its small, white, mouse-sized delivery vans scampering around our towns delivering the delectable cookies and rusks for which Ticklemouse is renowned.

In this case, the business wasn’t started by the mouse, though; it was started by Freya Stennett when she and her husband, Dave retired to Rooiels 15 years ago. They let two holiday flats below their house and because Freya wanted to make her guests feel welcome, she would bake a batch of biscuits and put them in each of the flats.

Shaye Poewe who together with husband Rainer have taken over the hands-on running of the Ticklemouse factory from her mother Freya in Pringle Bay.

PHOTO: Supplied

“Soon, returning visitors would say, ‘no biscuits, no booking’,” laughs Freya, “and then they would ask me to bake them another batch to take home with them; and then their friends started calling and asking if I could bake some for them, too. “Eventually, Dave thought we should give the biscuits a name and suggested Ticklemouse, his nickname as a baby. It turned out to be a good choice, catchy and the right image.”

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