Working with leaders in the dairy and food sector
We are predominantly a B2B business, and we work with many customers as their long-term supply partner, helping them to deliver their objectives through our responsible sourcing and supply chain management services.
We work with some of the leading businesses in the dairy and food sector, supplying a fantastic range of great tasting cheese as well as fresh milk, specialist dairy ingredients and whey proteins.
Great tasting cheese
In the UK our cheese is sold through our partner, Ornua, and supplied largely into the UK retailer market. Our strong relationship with Ornua sees us working closely with them, and their retail customers, on specific sustainability initiatives tailored to enhancing animal welfare and biodiversity, whilst improving farm efficiency and reducing carbon emissions. A great example of this is the Tesco Supply Group around our Haverfordwest Creamery, which sees dedicated farmers working closely with us and Tesco to improve sustainability and the long-term future of milk production.
In addition, working with specific customers in growth markets and alongside our international export partner, Hoogwegt Cheese, we export cheese to more than 26 countries across the world, with many of these contracts being for customer-specific recipes.
Fresh milk
Our largest fresh milk customer is Nestlé, and we sell to them through a long-term partnership, supplying milk to their coffee and confectionery businesses.
We work closely with the Nestlé team to deliver their Milk Plan. We’ve been working with them since 2003, and through this partnership around 90 of our farmers work on specific initiatives to reduce environmental impact, with each farmer getting a bonus for taking practical measures that protect and enhance the natural assets on their land.
Specialist ingredients and whey products
In 2022, we signed a new partnership with Arla Foods Ingredients. Through this partnership, we manufacture Nutrilac® FO-7875 on behalf of Arla Foods Ingredients using the company’s proprietary process, with Arla Foods Ingredients marketing and selling the product internationally. Developed by Arla Foods Ingredients, Nutrilac® FO-7875 is used as an ingredient to enhance the level of protein in food and drink products whilst retaining texture and taste and will be manufactured at our Lake District Creamery.
We also have a long-term agreement for whey supply to Volac, one of Europe’s leading manufacturers of nutritional whey and lactose products for the livestock and human health markets. Volac purchase the whey from our Haverfordwest Creamery.
Long-term partnerships
But our collaboration doesn’t end with our customers. We have long term relationships with Americold, a leading logistics provider to the food industry, who service the cheese maturation and distribution requirements for our creameries. We also work closely with milk logistics providers including Gregory Distribution, TP Niven and WM Armstrong who collect the milk from our members’ farms and deliver it to our creameries and our customers.
We also have a strategic alliance with Anglia Farmers, giving our dairy farmers access to inputs at the best possible price, while saving time and resources with support from AF's specialist buyers.
Specialist chilled dairy products
BV Dairy
Our BV Dairy works with a number of long-term customers across the UK, to provide specialist chilled dairy products such as creams, cultured products such as buttermilk, yoghurt and crème fraiche, and soft cheese into food manufacturers providing own-label products into the UK grocery retail sector, the food service sector and contract packing.