In 1907, Nils and Kari Lerum opened a small country store here at Sørheim on the Lustrafjorden. The locals did not always have cash, so they paid with raspberries. The Lerums did the obvious thing and started making saft, a concentrated fruit cordial that Norwegians dilute with water. It is a staple in every Norwegian household. By 1918 they were producing tens of thousands of litres. In 1919 they moved production to Sogndal because ice on the fjord kept blocking their deliveries.
Today Lerum is Norway's largest producer of saft and jam, still family-owned, with the founders' great-granddaughter as CEO. The original 1907 factory and the old store have been restored as a small museum. You can see the equipment they used to turn raspberries into an empire. They even held the Pepsi license for Norway until 1998, when they decided their own products were better.
Today Lerum is Norway's largest producer of saft and jam, still family-owned, with the founders' great-granddaughter as CEO. The original 1907 factory and the old store have been restored as a small museum. You can see the equipment they used to turn raspberries into an empire. They even held the Pepsi license for Norway until 1998, when they decided their own products were better.