The Gastro Gays sit down with Conor Sweeny, the founder of Dae, to discuss the surge in popularity for açaí in Ireland.
You will have probably seen those bowls with a base of deep burgundy-coloured fruit purée served in cafés, topped with all manner of nuts, seeds, fresh fruit and drizzles. You may have even queued to grab-and-go from one of the popular Oakberry stores around Dublin (with many more in the pipeline around the country).
More likely, though is that you have come across açaí via TikTok or Instagram, which has properly stoked the popularity of this native Brazilian fruit pulp for its colourful aesthetics and nutritional power. So what is açaí and why is it slowly popping up everywhere?
Think of where a grape like pinot noir, all dusty purple and grown in tight clusters, meets a blueberry or blackcurrant, and you have an idea of how açaí looks as it grows.
A popular 'healthy' option for those in sport or who track calories and want something fresh, cold and fruit-based for breakfast or as a pre- or post-workout source of fuel, açaí is also a bit of a superfood, nutrient-dense and a good source of fibre to help healthy digestion.
Conor Sweeny is the founder of Dae, a food product manufacturer who pivoted his entire business to açaí last year and is now leading Ireland’s largest açaí production facility — with further plans to grow and an eye on export.
A trained chef with over a decade’s experience in the food industry, Conor graduated from culinary arts in DIT Cathal Brugha Street (now TUD and moved to the Grangegorman campus) and worked in kitchens from small cafés and large buffet-style restaurant to fine dining kitchens.
Four years ago this April he founded his brand Dae (originally called Leamhain) by focusing on the freezer, producing allergen-free ice-cream and sweet treats like ice-cream cookie sandwiches and later dabbled in ambient retail with cookie dough bites and brownie bites.
"We always had a food service offering with an açaí option within that," he says, "but over the last year it’s just exploded and taken over the business".
The demand for the açaí has been so rampant he put the ice-cream back in the deep freeze, explaining "we made the difficult decision the start of the year to pull out of all retail, we were in nearly 500 stores across the country and now we're not in any consumer-facing retail anymore instead focusing solely on our açaí and fruit smoothie bases and working exclusively with small businesses".
It started with one café, then a second, a third followed quickly and, at the current tally, he now supplies over 100 different outlets across the island of Ireland, with a plan to undergo a funding round in the coming months in order to up-scale, ramping up production and staffing, moving to a bigger facility and begin exporting with the help of Enterprise Ireland.
Conor first experienced açaí via Brazilian ju-jitsu, a martial art he has practiced for over a decade and says "BJJ and açaí sort-of go hand-in-hand and the Brazilians I had trained with were always talking about it as being a nutrient-dense ingredient so I have been around it and eating it about a decade so kind of know what authentic açaí tastes like".
Through his business connections he was able to connect with a co-op of organic farmers just outside Belém in Pará, the region where 90-95% of all Brazilian açaí is grown, and source directly.
"They pick the berries and within 24 hours get pressed into blocks and frozen, then sent over to us after a couple of weeks," and Conor adds that though this is a seasonal product ("two harvests a year, early September until about now in spring") having it as a frozen product can offer year-round supply.
What’s the draw for the outlet? "If done right there is a big margin on açaí," Conor explains, "so with coffee, milk, butter and the cost of producing pastry going up cafés are looking for ways to make their margin to survive and it helps that açaí is on trend and popular, so has the potential to make that café a little extra bit of income they might not have ordinarily considered".
A big risk three years in to pivot a food production business to a trending dish but the sums have added up, "I was doing the figures for Q1 of 2025 and I estimate we have supplied enough açaí to sell something like 113,000 bowls, which would generate €1.13 million back into small communities around Ireland".
He is very happy with the switch, adding "if we were in retail, that would all be going back to, you know, Germany, for the discounters, or Tesco in the UK, so for us it was a great move".
With increasing demand comes a strain on supply and Conor reports the total production yield from his suppliers was down 75%, "so mixed with rising global popularity and demand everyone's kind of been left to squeeze — our product per kilo went up by 60% give or take so you have factor that in".
As this product is sourced from the Amazon region there are also issues to navigate on the ground which threaten output, from flooding and forest fires to deforestation, slavery and child labour. "Our own co-op is completely fair trade, ethical, organic, anti-slavery, anti-deforestation," Conor says, "but there are big revolutions happening in the industry right now and I think organic açaí is getting harder and harder to grow as it scales".
Another key player in the Irish açaí market is Oakberry, the world’s #1 açaí brand and a Brazilian-owned behemoth with over 700 stores across 40 countries. The first ROI outpost opened in September 2023 on South Anne Street in Dublin, steps from Grafton Street, and raked in sales of €1.3m last year.
The store also ranks within the top five best-performing Oakberry stores globally, outperforming the likes of London, Lisbon and Paris to be the top sales performer in Europe.
Three young Irish business minds - Nick Twomey, Cian O'Donoghue, and Ben Mulligan - brought the global brand to these shores by acquiring the ‘Master Oakberry Franchise’ and remarking on the upward surge for convenience foods which are plant-based and nutritious.
Their bowls, served in cups ranging from 270ml to 650ml, are priced between €11.45 and €17 (at the time of writing) while their menu also includes a range of other fruit-packed smoothies.
"As delicious as [açaí] is there are also amazing health benefits, which is why they are so globally associated with a healthy crowd", Oakberry co-owner Ben Mulligan says. "The açai pulp is a natural antioxidant that neutralises free radicals and contains minerals like Potassium and Calcium, Vitamin E, healthy fats like Omega 6 and 9".
The trio already operate a number of outlets in Dublin, including Blanchardstown Centre, Nutgrove and Swords, but plan to have 18-20 locations by the end of 2025, with Galway and Cork key locations of interest as well as a Temple Bar location in the works.
Dae and Oakberry may be focused on slightly paths to market but the increasing demand for açaí shows no signs of stalling across Ireland.
