Roger McKechnie, businessman who co-founded the Phileas Fogg range of snacks
Roger McKechnie, businessman who co-founded the Phileas Fogg range of snacks
Telegraph ObituariesSun, July 26, 2026 at 1:44 PM UTC
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Roger McKechnie, left, with Norman Tebbit at the Business Enterprise Awards lunch at the Savoy in 1986
Roger McKechnie, who has died aged 84, was the serial entrepreneur behind Phileas Fogg, the eye-catching 1980s brand of spicy snacks.
McKechnie founded Derwent Valley Foods in 1982, with three partners and start-up grants, at Consett in Co Durham, whose steelworks had recently closed with the loss of 3,700 jobs. Under the branding of Phileas Fogg, the intrepid hero of Jules Vernes’s Around the World in Eighty Days – a brainwave that came to him in the pub after fruitless brainstorming – the venture developed a range of strongly flavoured products aimed at adult snackers.
Their breakthrough product was Tortilla Chips, then a novelty for UK consumers; Punjab Puri and garlicky Mignon Morceaux also became bestsellers. From 1988, a television ad campaign created surreal back-stories that echoed the Monty Python comedy genre: one such recounted the ill-fated expedition of Colonel Tomkins-Warburton, who is eventually told by a Hindustani hermit that he “could have got authentic Punjab Puri from Medomsley Road, Consett”.
The company grew to employ 300 workers in the town. In 1993, the partners sold for £24 million to the United Biscuits conglomerate, McKechnie turning his original five-figure stake into a payout of several millions. But despite the new owner’s distribution power, Phileas Fogg faded as a brand, while McKechnie embarked on a variety of new ventures based on his belief that “If you get a good idea, go for it and bash on.”
The most enduring of these was his conversion of Dove Nest, an 18th-century mansion overlooking Lake Windermere he acquired in the mid-1990s, to create The Samling as a luxurious boutique hotel which welcomed a roll-call of celebrities led by Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.
Roger Anthony Nigel McKechnie was born in Darlington on May 24 1941, the son of a bank manager, Harry McKechnie, and his wife Freda, née Taylor. Roger was educated at Wrekin College and studied economics at Newcastle University before starting his career in marketing with Proctor & Gamble.
His next move was to the Sunderland-based maker of the popular north-eastern brand of Tudor Crisps. Its parent, Associated Biscuits, wanted him to move south to marketing the bigger Smiths Crisps range, but he preferred to stay in his home region – and made the leap into entrepreneurship with Phileas Fogg.
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After the lucrative sale to United Biscuits, McKechnie’s fortunes were more mixed. He counted as “my greatest mistake” his involvement with a cousin in a venture to supply equipment to aid agencies in Africa. Demand dwindled as wars subsided in Angola and Mozambique, and after three years’ struggle, the business failed. “The main thing I learnt was that I didn’t know the marketplace,” McKechnie recalled. “A lot of emotional activity went in, rather than total objectivity… Since that experience, I’ve tried to become as objective as possible.”
More successful was Tanfield Foods, which supplied Look What We Found gourmet ready-meal products, emphasising the quality of locally sourced ingredients, for upmarket retailers, airlines and home delivery.
In 1996 McKechnie established the Samling Foundation (now the Samling Institute for Young Artists, based in Hexham, Northumberland) to provide support and residencies for singers, musicians and actors.
Samling is a Norse word for “gathering” or “collective”; the charity’s later activities extended to coaching for talented youngsters across the North East as well as full-scale opera productions and concert programmes. McKechnie’s co-founder Karon Wright described him as “a one-off: wacky, challenging in all the best ways, kind, generous, clever and a whole of lot of fun to be with”.
He was appointed MBE in 1989.
Roger McKechnie married, in 1966, Dr Eileen O’Hagan, whom he had met at university. They had six children of their own and adopted three more after a family bereavement; one daughter predeceased them.
Roger McKechnie, born May 24 1941, died April 24 2026
Source: “AOL Money”
