Müller Wiseman’s new £17m butter plant in Market Drayton has started commercial production.
The plant, which is the UK’s largest, went live on Saturday (2 November), ahead of its formal opening in early December, producing butter for the food manufacturing sector.
It can produce up to 45,000 tonnes of butter a year, and is being pitched by Müller as a way to optimise the returns on the 90,000 tonnes of surplus cream a year created by its fresh milk, cream, yoghurt and chilled desserts divisions, and to increase the UK’s self-sufficiency in butter.
“Butter imports into the UK were above 100,000 tonnes last year,” said Müller UK & Ireland group CEO Ronald Kers. “We want to start to address this by offering butter made in Britain with cream from milk produced by British dairy farms.”
Kers added: “We are building a dairy company in the UK which is diverse, operates in different markets and allows us to innovate and add value to the milk that we buy to the benefit of the company, its employees, customers and the dairy farmers who supply us.”
Although production at the plant is currently focused on the food manufacturing sector, Müller has not ruled out an eventual move into the branded butter market. In Germany, Müller is present in the branded butter market through its Weihenstephan and Sachsenmilch brands.
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