Price of milk in the UK from 1990 to 2019, both each month and the two-year average. Values are in 2019 prices.
In Europe, UK milk production is third after France & Germany and is around the tenth highest in the world. There are around 12,000 dairy farms in the UK.[2]
Around 14 billion litres of milk are commercially produced in the UK each year.
Britain eats around 2000 tonnes of cheese a day. The World Cheese Awards are run by the Guild of Fine Food.
History
Nestlé, as the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company, opened a creamery, to make condensed milk, in Aylesbury in September 1870; the Aylesbury Vale area was a known dairy region. Semley in south-west Wiltshire, near Dorset, had the first site in the UK, around 1871, to cool milk, for transportation, on the West of England line. Anthony Hailwood started his Cheshire Sterilised Milk Company in 1894, the first in the UK.
St Ivel made a range of products in Yeovil in Somerset.[3]
The World Dairy Congress was held in London in June 1928. The manufacture of ice-cream was discussed, with Prof Albert Mertens of Louvain University in Belgium, and Otto Gratz of the Royal Hungarian Dairy Experimental Station.[4]
In the 1930s the Dairy Show was held in Islington, in late October; since 2010 it has been held at the NEC. At a meeting of the Royal Empire Society in January 1931, with Sir William Wayland, it was decided to form the Empire Dairy Council, in offices on Northumberland Avenue.[5]
In October 1931, to protect the French dairy industry, France imposed quotas on dairy exports to France.[6]
In the 1930s Cadbury made 900 tons of Dairy Milk a week, from 26 million gallons of milk a year, with plants in Denbighshire, Knighton in Staffordshire, Marlbrook in Hereford, and Newent and Frampton-on-Severn in Gloucestershire. During the war, only two million gallons of this milk went to chocolate production, with the rest for cheese production. By 1952, Cadbury collected 29 million gallons of milk, with 5 million for chocolate [7] Cadbury circumvented government rationing by supplying milk from its site at Rathmore, County Kerry; a third of the milk that Cadbury required came from this Irish plant. The Ministry of Food stopped restricting milk production on April 1 1954.
The International Dairy Congress was held in London in June 1959, with chairman Sir Thomas Peacock, with research led by Professor Herbert Davenport Kay CBE FRS (1893-1976).
In 1960 Somerset produced the most milk in England.[8]
From November 1967, the Milk Distributive Council of England and Wales introduced a voluntary colour code of milk bottle tops.[10] From December 1 1973, a compulsory colour code for milk bottle tops was introduced.[11] South Devon and Channel Island milk had had the 'gold top' trade distinctions since 1956.[12]
In the mid-1970s, the UK imported 80% of its dairy products. Unigate in the 1970s was the largest dairy company in the UK, with the Unigate Foods division trading under the well-known 'St Ivel' label, headquartered in Wootton Bassett in north Wiltshire near Swindon.[13]
In July 1979, Unigate sold 75% of its milk production to the Milk Marketing Board for £55m. This gave the Milk Marketing Board 22% of butter in England and Wales, and 25% of cheese.[14]
By 1985, 40% of milk was bought in supermarkets.
In January 1989, Unigate, run by John Clement, sold all its milk processing north of the Thames to Dairy Crest, for £152m (£126m net). The sale included seven processing sites and eighty nine distribution depots. Before the sale Unigate produced a third of liquid milk in England and Wales. It gave Dairy Crest 16% of milk processing in England and Wales.[15]
The Food Safety Act 1990 introduced supermarket 'best before' and 'use by' dates. The British milk industry became deregulated on 1 November 1994.
Arla operations in the UK merged with Express Dairies, of Leicester, with chairman Sir David Naish, to become Arla UK in October 2003.[16]
Friesland Campina UK, of the Netherlands, moved from Horsham in West Sussex, to London in 2024; their Yazoo (drink), launched in 1987, is the most popular flavoured milk product in the UK.
Butter
In the 1920s Katharine Coward researched the amount of vitamins present in butter.
In 1924 half of the UK's butter came from within the British Empire, and 90% of the UK's cheese. In the 1930s Denmark was the largest exporter of dairy produce in Europe.[17] In 1931, the UK imported around 120,000 tons of Danish butter.[18] In 1936, 53% of butter imports came from the British Empire.[19] In 1938 the UK imported 472,000 tons of butter.[20]
From Monday March 1940, the butter ration was increased to eight ounces a week.[22] From Monday July 22 1940, the ration was six ounces from either butter or margarine.[23] By August 1940, butter supplies were reducing. From June 30 1941, the butter ration was reduced from four to two ounces, per week.
Butter rationing finished in the Netherlands on June 23 1949, but the Netherlands had had immensely severe food shortages.[25] Butter rationing in Denmark caused a change of government in late October 1950, when Hans Hedtoft was replaced by Erik Eriksen,[26] who stopped the rationing of butter, a week later, on November 7 1950; it had been introduced in Denmark on November 9 1940.[27]
Butter, with cheese, rationing finished on May 8 1954, under Charles Hill, Baron Hill of Luton.[28] During the war people ate two and a half times the amount of margarine than of butter. Only in 1958 did butter consumption overtake margarine. When rationing finished, the national consumption of butter increased by 51% from 1953 to 1957. Consumption of margarine dropped by 9%. Consumption of sugar rose by 30%. [29]
In the drought year of 1959, the UK produced 3% of its butter. In the early 1960s, the UK produced 12% of its butter.
After the Second World War, New Zealand shipped its excess production of butter to the UK. Anchor butter largely became a top-seller from then on.
The Butter Information Council was set up on May 4 1954, by butter producers in Australia and Denmark. It became the Butter Council in 1981, and closed in December 1995.[30]
Country Life butter began in 1970. St Ivel owned the St Hubert and Le Fleurier spreads in France, until 2017, made in Ludres in Grand Est.
In 1975 the UK was producing only 5% of its butter requirements; New Zealand supplied 20% (Anchor butter). It had been only 5% of butter from British manufacturers in 1938, hence butter was so stringently rationed in the Second World War. In 1973, the UK had produced 20% of its butter requirements, importing around 500,000 tonnes of butter.[31]
The other main foreign supplier of butter, in the 1970s, was Lurpak, of Denmark, also part of the EEC, and Lurpak was selling more and more to Britain during the 1970s; Danelea butter also came from Denmark. By 1975 Germany claimed to export 10% of British butter requirements, with exports increasing from 3,000 tonnes in 1973 to 40,000 tonnes in 1975.
DFDS routes
In the 1960s two ships of the United Steamship Company (now DFDS) Blenda and Alexandra brought 1,200 tons, each week, of Danish butter, eggs and bacon, to North Shields docks. The two ships were referred to as 'the butter boats' or 'the butter service', taking 18 hours. [32] Danish freight also went from the Port of Esbjerg to the Grimsby; the freight route to Newcastle stopped, but Esbjerg to Immingham is the main route from 1995, on the Tor Line until 2010, now DFDS Seaways.[33]
In 1978, Anchor butter, of New Zealand, was the best-selling make of butter in the UK, but the EEC wanted to stop all imports of Anchor butter to the UK. Consumption of butter in the UK was around 400,000 tonnes, with around 100,000 tonnes of imported Anchor butter. Country Life butter was around 30,000 tonnes in 1977.[34]
By the mid-1980s New Zealand was exporting around 25% of British butter requirements. The EC blocked exports of Anchor butter at no more than around 78,000 tonnes, a strategy that had been largely instigated by Austin Deasy of Ireland. [35]
After the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in July 1985, New Zealand released Alain Mafart and Dominique Prieur, in return for France allowing imports of Anchor butter into the UK, which France had agreed. Anchor butter was frozen in transit, and took five weeks to reach the UK.[36]
Anchor Spreadable was introduced in 1991, the first of its kind. HM Customs and Excise claimed that this new product was not a natural butter, but a manufactured product. Imported butter had an import duty of around 35p per tub. HM Customs and Excise wanted 98p of import duty, but lost the case of New Zealand Milk Products in February 1999 in the High Court.[37]
Anchor butter was made from October 2001 by Arla Foods, when it bought the UK interests of New Zealand Milk.[38]Fonterra dairy co-operative made Anchor butter elsewhere, also formed in 2001.
In the 2010s butter was now selling well, up 17% year on year. By 2011 Country Life butter produced 11% of British requirements; but around 75% of butter sold in the UK was imported. Lurpak, of Denmark, sold the best, providing 42% of British requirements.[39]
Cheese
In 1938 the UK produced only 23% of its requirements for cheese, leading to heavy rationing in the Second World War.
In 1938 the UK imported 149,000 tons of cheese. Before being invaded in May 1940, the Netherlands produced 124,000 tons of cheese, and exported 58,000 tons; after the invasion, the Germans took all of the Dutch cheese, as well as the cream.[40] In 1941 the UK was to receive 45% of the total cheese output of the US.[41]
Cheese rationing began on May 5 1941,[42][43] at one ounce per week.[44] Vegetarians could have eight ounces.[45] Cheese rations could be bought for four weeks, at a time.[46] Schools could serve cheese, as part of an 'Oslo dinner'. Pubs could not serve cheese.[47]
The cheese ration increased to two ounces a week from June 30 1941. Diabetics had an increased ration.[48] Dairy imports from the US, across the Atlantic, replaced the previous imports from British Empire countries.[49]
Before the war, 3,500 tons of cheese, per week, was consumed, which had increased to 4,500 tons in 1951. Three-quarters of cheese was imported. The UK made around 52,000 tons a year of cheese before the war; in 1951 it was 44,000 tons. Around 1951 the cheese ration was briefly increased to three ounces per week, but was reduced to two ounces in April 1951.[50] By late 1951, cheese was also still rationed in Norway.[51] On April 20 1952 the cheese ration was reduced to only one ounce per week.[52]
Cheese, with butter, rationing finished on May 8 1954. During the war, and up to May 1954, cheese production in factories increased by almost three times as much, from 1939. But production of regional cheeses, such as Double Gloucester, almost vanished. Most cheese was Cheddar or Cheshire. [53]
By 1973 the UK produced 56% of British cheese requirements, and 75% by 1975.
By the early 1970s, half of the Cheddar cheese eaten in the UK was made in New Zealand and Australia. As the UK entered the EEC, these imports would be phased out, due to European trade restrictions. England produced 160,000 tons of cheese each year in 1972.[54] Consumption of cheese in the UK increased 24% from 1974 to 1982 to 272,000 tonnes, with two-thirds of that Cheddar.[55]
Lymeswold cheese was introduced in the south of England in October 1981, and across the UK in September 1982, due to an over-supply of milk. It was developed by Dairy Crest at Crudgington, and manufactured at Cannington in Somerset. It was selling £5m a year in 1984, and outsold all other blue cheeses.
Cheshire Bakkavör site in July 2022
All was going well until Lymeswold production was moved to Aston by Wrenbury (Newhall, Cheshire), near Nantwich in Cheshire in April 1984, to make 4,000 tonnes per year. This would be equal to the annual British consumption of Stilton cheese, which was an optimistic sales figure, and four times the production of the former Cannington plant.[56][57][58] There were technical difficulties in the product, and sales soon plummeted. Dairy Crest removed it in May 1992.
The Cheshire site was bought by New Primebake, in 1993 for £0.75m, who were later bought by Bakkavör in 2006. From September 1993, the site now makes 6 million garlic baguettes every week, with 70 tonnes of butter; nearly all garlic baguettes in British supermarkets are produced at that Cheshire site.
In the early 1990s the EC limited milk for British cheese manufacturers, with the result that the UK imported five times the amount of Cheddar that it exported.[59]
The cheese and milk division of Unigate merged with Dairy Crest in July 2000.
In 2018, 80% of Cheddar cheese imported into the UK came from the Republic of Ireland, worth £700m to Ireland. In 2022 a third of UK milk goes into making cheese; 70% of that cheese is Cheddar. Around 130,000 tonnes of cheese is exported.
Most mozzarella in the UK is made in Germany, such as by DMK Deutsches Milchkontor, but the two Leprino Foods mozzarella plants in North Wales and County Down, in Northern Ireland, are Europe's largest producer of mozzarella.
France makes four times as much cheese as the UK, and eat around three times as much.
Yoghurt
Ski Yoghurt started in Haywards Heath in Sussex; Express Dairies bought the company, and moved production to a purpose-built site Cheshire, next to the A49. It was the first purpose-built yoghurt plant in the UK.
Nestlé bought the Chambourcy yoghurt in 1978; Chambourcy Foods was the British division.
Yoplait, of France, formed joint-venture with Dairy Crest and Sodiaal in September 1991.
Nestlé bought the Ski yoghurt enterprise, and the Fromage Frais division of Eden Vale, on 31 January 2002; Ski yoghurt had 11% of British yoghurt consumption; Müller had 30%.[60] Eden Vale had been bought in February 1992, and sold again in May 2004 for £16.5m.
Danone, of France, bought the yoghurts division of Dairy Crest in August 2002 for £32m.
Nestlé Girvan, off the A77 on Grangestone Industrial Estate on the Scottish west coast in South Ayrshire since 1979, it supplies factories at York and Halifax, and previously at Fawdon, with milk supplied from Ayrshire; it makes 20,000 tonnes of milk chocolate crumb, per year; it made Blue Riband (biscuits) until 2017
Lochaben, two miles west of Lockerbie, Dumfriesshire, north of the A709, on the west side of the River Annan; former Independent Dairies in the 1950s, former Milk Link now Arla since 2012, the largest dairy plant in Scotland, it makes cheddar cheese.[61] On the afternoon of Friday July 4 1975, the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh toured the Express Dairy Foods Factory, with the chairman of the Express Dairy Company, J Travers Clarke. It makes 42,000 tonnes of cheese per year.
Stranraer Creamery on the A77 road, seen in May 2017
Stranraer, Dumfries & Galloway, makes 'Seriously Spreadable' soft cheddar cheese, formerly McLelland, bought by Lactalis (Nestlé) in 2005, known as the Caledonian Cheese Company; the Princess Royal opened the extended Galloway Creamery, partly owned by Unigate and the Scottish Co-operative Wholesale Society, on Friday October 4 1991,[62] later bought by McLelland and Sons in 1995, then Lactalis in 2005
Wales
Chwilog, South Caenarfon Creameries, opened by the Prince of Wales, and his wife, on Tuesday July 5 2016[63]
Glanyrafon, Ceredigion, east of Llanbadarn, owned by Rachel's Organic, known for organic yoghurt, started in 1984 by Rachel Roberts, the daughter of Dinah Williams, who was a colleague of Lady Eve Balfour, the niece of Arthur Balfour, and known for the Haughley Experiment in Suffolk in 1939. Visited by the Prince of Wales, a known connoisseur and advocate of organic food products, on Tuesday July 28 1998, followed by a visit to the Pwllpeiran Upland Research Centre at Cwmystwyth.[64] An ardent consumer of organic food, the Prince of Wales visited the organic yoghurt factory again, on Monday July 10 2017, to open a new extension.[65] It now makes the rest of Nestlé yoghurt, including Ski yoghurt
The Glanbia Cheese mozzarella plant in December 2008
Llangefni, in central Anglesey, sold to Cadbury in February 1954, for Cadbury Dairy Milk chocolate[66][67] former Dairy Crest site which planned to close in March 1988,[68] but was bought by Golden Dairies in June 1988 as a cheese plant.[69] Leprino Foods, formerly owned by Glanbia Cheese, US-owned, with the Northern Ireland plant, both sites make a third of all UK cheese exports, and both are Europe's largest producer of mozzarella, with headquarters in Rudheath in Cheshire
Pembrokeshire Creamery, opened in July 2024; from 2019 to 2024 Wales had no large-scale milk processing site; milk previously had to be taken to Gloucestershire, off the M5
Wrexham, former Ash Manor Cheese, bought by Dale Farm, of Northern Ireland, in February 2014, a cheese packing plant
County Tyrone, Fivemiletown Creamery, opened in April 1972, since 2014 owned by the Dale Farm cooperative, visited by the Prince of Wales on Tuesday May 16 2006[70]
Magheralin in County Down, off the A3, from the M1 motorway (Northern Ireland) junction 9; opened by the Bovril Group on May 11 1948, cost £250,000, it made Cheddar cheese.[71] the plant later made Ambrosia Creamed Rice from the mid-1960s, and later owned by Express Foods from the early 1970s, bought by Glanbia Cheese in November 2000. Leprino Foods (US), makes mozzarella, with another mozzarella plant in North Wales
Stourton, north of junction 44 of the M1, the third-biggest dairy in UK, after Arla Aylesbury and Müller Droitwich, it opened around October 2004, the headquarters of Arla UK
North West England
Appleby-in-Westmorland, situated in the Eden Valley in Cumbria, so giving the name to Eden Valley Foods, when owned by Eden Dairy UK Ltd, formerly Express Dairies; it was visited by Princess Anne on Monday July 1 1985,[73] and the Prince of Wales on Tuesday April 11 2017.[74]
Aspatria, north-west Cumbria, the Lake District Creamery makes cheddar cheese, former Dairy Crest
Dalston factory in May 2018
Nestlé Dalston, since 1992 the site has made packets of coffee mixes, powdered milk, and Coffee-Mate, on the B5299 south of Carlisle at Dalston, Cumbria; the factory opened in 1962, built from April 1961, costing £250,000[75]
Kirkby in Merseyside, off the A5207, on the east side of junction 4 of the M57 motorway, on the north side of the East Lancashire Road; was St Ivel (Unigate) had a smaller depot on the Stockpit Road Industrial Estate, until in July 1996, when Unigate bought a 53-acre plant on Moorgate Road, of Kraft Jacobs Suchard, for £77m, which had opened in 1957.[76] The site was bought by Kraft in November 1954, on the East Lancashire Road, next to an ICI factory, to replace its site at Hayes in Middlesex.[77]Philadelphia Cream Cheese production began in 1960. Cheese production moved to Bad Fallingbostel in Germany and to Namur in Belgium in 1983. Dairylea (cheese) is today made in Namur in Belgium. 900 workers had left the former Kirkby plant in 1983. St Ivel spreads production was moved from Hemyock, in Devon, at the end of 1998. Dairy Crest later bought the St Ivel Spreads division in October 2002 for £86m.[78] The Kirkby site has made Country Life butter since the Crudgington plant closed in 2014.
Müller Manchester, opened by Robert Wiseman in August 1995, built on a former Esso distribution depot on Moseley Road in Trafford Park, costing £12m
Marlston-cum-Lache, south of Chester, next to the A483 junction with the A55; the former site of Bodfari Foods, who had another site at Stretton Tilston, which closed, after being bought in July 1992[79]
Worleston, south Cheshire, makes Pilgrims Choice cheddar for Ornua Foods; the cheddar cheese was previously made in Wincanton in Somerset in the 1990s, and also made by North Downs Dairy at Bobbing Hill in Bobbing, Kent[80]
Nestlé Tutbury, mostly a coffee plant, in South Derbyshire, on the A511 road next to Tutbury and Hatton railway station; from 2006 it has made 25m Dolce Gusto capsules a week which contain milk, with 90% exported to 38 countries, including the US and Mexico; with the Nestlé plant in Girana, in Spain, it is one of the two main European production sites for Dolce Gusto capsules.
West Midlands
Droitwich, Müller, the second-biggest dairy in the UK after Arla Aylesbury, opened by Robert Wiseman, of East Kilbride, in late April 2001; construction started on the 77-acre plant, in March 2000, costing £35m, at Stonebridge Cross Business Park[82]
Knighton, Stafford, the Knighton Factory, situated on the Shropshire boundary, with High Offley directly to the east, for North Shropshire or south Cheshire. It was opened in 1911 by Cadbury.[83] It made condensed milk in the 1910s. A new £500,000 factory opened in 1965.[84] It makes powdered milk, and made Marvel (food) from 1965, owned by Cadbury Typhoo in the late 1970s, and made the Cadbury's Chocolate Break drink from 1985. There was a £2.5m explosion at 9.15pm on Thursday 17 April 1986 in the Coffee Compliment plant.[85][86][87] It was fined £1,000 by Eccleshall magistrates in January 1987.[88] It had a management buyout in 1986, who were bought by Hillsdown Holdings in May 1989.[89]
Leek, Staffordshire, Ornua Foods has packed Pilgrim's Choice cheese, since 2010; previously it was packed in Wincanton in Somerset; a butter plant was opened by Frederick Adams in 1925, and the new factory opened in 1975
Market Drayton, north-east Shropshire, Müller yoghurts, opened a butter plant in 2014.
Minsterley, west Shropshire, directly on A488, south-west of Shrewsbury, next to the former Minsterley branch line; it made condensed milk in the 1930s[90][91] and was owned by Independent Dairies in the 1950s,[92] later Express Dairies as a butter plant from the 1960s,[93] it made Fromage Frais, from 1990;[94] it won awards for its M&S lemon curd thick and creamy yogurt in 2003;[95] it makes chilled desserts for Sainsbury's and M&S; it has been in constant operation since 1906, Cadbury chilled desserts are made here. A former Eden Vale site that made Ski yoghurt, and desserts, 26 acres, sold to Uniq in May 2004
Nuneaton, £33m site, built from 1999 on Walsingham Drive in Bermuda Park, with the Dairy Crest distribution site, and cheese packing[96]
Oswestry, in the south-east, off the A483 bypass, Arla cheese packing plant
Lifton, Devon, built next to the South Devon and Tavistock Railway; the process to make canned rice pudding was developed at Lapford in 1936; the redeveloped Ambrosia Creamery opened in April 1959, with production moving from Lapford by Bovril Group, bought by Cavenham Foods in 1971.[98] Ambrosia Creamed Rice was also made by the Magheralin site in County Down from the mid-1960s
North Tawton, central Devon, west of the village, north of the A3072, mostly built 1974 by Express Foods, owned by Arla Foods, the Taw Valley Creamery opened in 1874, visited by the Prince of Wales on Wednesday March 19 1980[99]
Staplemead Creamery, in east Somerset, in November 2005
Oldford, east Somerset near the Wiltshire border, Staplemead Creamery, built next to the former Wilts, Somerset and Weymouth Railway. Express Dairy Group bought the Aplin & Barrett site in 1962,[100] opened by Express Dairies around 1963, for the production of cream, on the outskirts of Frome.[101] Made Ski yoghurt for Eden Vale, taken over by Milk Link, now makes desserts; bought from Milk Link in 2008 by Andros (company), of France, who make the well-known popular Bonne Maman chilled desserts, and in a joint arrangement with Arla
The Severnside factory off the A419 road, seen in October 2014, formerly Dairy Crest
Stonehouse, Gloucestershire, the Severnside Dairy, former Dairy Crest, opened in 1979. Frijj milkshake was developed at Crudgington in Shropshire in 1991. The large dairy was developed from 2001, costing £39m,[102] now owned by Müller
Unilever Gloucester, although many ice-creams are reconstituted vegetable oil, with no dairy origin, the Magnum (ice cream), it makes, is a dairy product, and has been the UK's best-selling ice-cream for over thirty years
Westbury Creamery, run by Arla in Wiltshire, makes Anchor butter. On the West Wilts Trading Estate, in the north-west of town, off the B3097, close to Heywood, Wiltshire to the north, and Dilton Marsh close to the west, a former Eden Vale plant, visited by the Princess Royal on Monday September 6 2004[104]
Wyke Champflower, east Somerset, makes Wyke Farms cheddar. Started by Tom Clothier from the 1930s, with milk from the Mendip Hills, followed by his sons John and Jim.[105][106] It started packing their own cheese from 1982 under the current insignia, making 12 tons of cheese a day by 1987, and sold under the insignia from 1993,[107] turning over £30m by 1998.[108] Cheese packing site is off the A303 in Wincanton.
Trewithen Dairy in March 2016
Former production sites
Cheddar cheese
Cheese packing factory in January 2007 at the Mauchline Creamery, at Haugh in East Ayrshire
Crewe, Cheshire, the former northern distribution depot of Dairy Crest, on Weston Road, it was a former company owned by Sir Wesley Emberton, the chairman from 1952-67 of Cheshire County Council
Frome, north-east Somerset, former main cheese-packing plant for Cathedral City, until moved to Nuneaton
Haugh, East Ayrshire, the Mauchline Creamery opened in 1936, making butter, cream and cheese until 2008
Johnstown, Carmarthen, Unigate, taken over by Dairy Crest in 1979, with 441 employees, closed in May 1986,[109] due to EEC cheese imports,[110] notably from Germany and Ireland from 1983[111]
Lisnaskea, County Fermanagh, Fermanagh Creameries, opened by Unigate in November 1972, made 6,000 tonnes of Cheddar, Double Gloucester and Leicester cheeses each year, part of Dairy Crest,[112] it closed in November 2000; Dairy Crest had taken over the Unigate cheese factories in July 2000[113]
Llandyrnog Creamery in January 2012
Llandyrnog, north Denbighshire, directly on the B5429, a , former Co-op site, made cheddar cheese for Arla Foods, closed in 2018, with 97 staff
Maelor Creamery, Dairy Crest, at Marchwiel, Clwyd, costing £8m. It was built on a former Cadbury plant, to replace creameries at Wem and Four Crosses near Oswestry, which remained open until December 1992. It was one of the largest creameries in the UK, and was computer-controlled from the start.[114] The first stage was completed in July 1974, with butter production to start in 1975, with around 30,000 tonnes a year.[115] It was officially opened by the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh in May 1976, with Sir Richard Trehane. [116] It would make Cheddar and Cheshire cheese from April 1977, processing 250,000 gallons of milk a day, making 1,200 tons of dairy products a week.[117] 110,000 gallons of milk a day would be for cheese production.[118] In 1987 Cheshire cheese production would be transferred from Whitchurch, in Shropshire, and Haslington in south Cheshire, near the M6.[119] Butter and skimmed milk powder production ended in May 1990.[120] Cheese production ended in June 1993, but it remained as a main cheese packing plant for Cathedral City,[121] as a cheese packing plant for First Milk it closed in March 2014
Milborne St Andrew, central Dorset, formed in 1929 as an additional site for another at Briantspuddle, Independent Dairies in the 1950s, later Express Dairy Group
Sturminster Newton, north Dorset, former Milk Marketing Board, as Dairy Crest closed in 2000
Other cheese
Aston by Wrenbury, south Cheshire on the A530, the Aston Creamery had been making cheese since 1914, made Lymeswold cheese for Dairy Crest from 1984 to May 1992; the site now produces most supermarket garlic baguettes for Bakkavör
Augher, County Tyrone
Ballynure, County Antrim, it was built during the war; Antrim Creameries opened a cheese plant on April 30 1967, which made Lancashire, Double Gloucester and Leicester for Unigate;[122] the cheese plant was officially opened July 5 1967[123]
Ellesmere, Shropshire, Dairy Crest production closed in late January 1987, and cheese packing finished in early April 1987; Double Gloucester and Leicester cheese production was moved to the Maelor Creamery in north-east Wales[124]
Harby, Leicestershire, blue cheese, it originally started in 1918, but was built from June 1974 by Unigate Foods, costing £2m[125]; the new site was opened on Monday 18 July 1977, by Unigate chairman Jonathan Fry, to make 1,600 tons per year;[126] it was sold to management-buyout Millway Foods in March 1988,[127] and later worked with Bongrain of France, now Savencia Fromage & Dairy, who bought it;[128] it was visited by Russian deputy minister Maria Scirotina on July 5 1996; by 1999 it had 170 staff, and was bought in March 1999 by Dairy Crest for £2.5m,[129] who closed the site in late April 2001[130]
Haslington, south Cheshire near the M6, made Cheshire cheese until 1987
Hayes, Middlesex, Kraft, made processed cheese from 1926 to 1957; Dairylea spreadable cheese began in 1950
Hemel Hempstead, west Hertfordshire, Dairy Crest cheese-packing plant, closed in November 1991, with packing moved to Maelor in Wales, but the distribution centre remained[131]
Longridge, central Lancashire, closed by Dairy Crest on 1 November 1994
Pipe Gate (Woore), north-east Shropshire, Express Dairy, close to Staffordshire and south Cheshire, closed mid-1960
West Ulster, Irvinestown, County Fermanagh, made mozzarella until around 2015
Butter
Chard Junction creamery in March 2010
Chard Junction Creamery, next to Chard Junction railway station, in the south of Somerset, next to the Dorset border. Was United Dairies when opened in 1937,[132] then Unigate from 1959, and St Ivel in the early 1990s; in the 1950s this was the largest butter plant in the world; in May 1957 it produced 86 tons of butter in one day, a world record. Main butter production stopped in 2003, replaced by alcohol butter (brandy butter) and cream products; closed in late 2015.
Former Dairy Crest butter factory at Crudgington in east Shropshire
Crudgington, east Shropshire, north of Telford, former Unigate, largely made 'Country Life' butter.[133] Lymeswold cheese was developed there from 1979-82, at the Dairy Crest Research and Development Centre,[134][135][136] which was officially opened on June 6 1974 by Sir Henry Plumb,[137] the site suffered a large fire in January 1996,[138] and closed as Dairy Crest in 2014, with production of Country Life butter moving to Kirkby in Merseyside
Felinfach, Wales, opened in 1951, closed in 1988.[139] Champlaine Protex built a cheese factory next door; This site, as Aeron Valley, closed in February 2007. A Dairygold cheese-packing plant, of County Cork, closed in 2006.
Former butter factory at Great Torrington, owned by Dairy Crest, seen in March 2009
Great Torrington, north Devon, Unigate, closed around 1993 when Dairy Crest
Hemyock, Devon, formed in 1886, later to be home of St Ivel spreads, which closed in late 1998, with production moving to the Unigate site at Kirkby in Merseyside. In the Blackdown Hills it made St Ivel Gold from 1986 to 1999. Any Questions was broadcast from the site in December 1987, with Roy Jenkins and Tony Blair.[140]
Honiton, east Devon, Express Dairies, 1969 to 1992
Ruyton-XI-Towns, Shropshire, owned by Kraft from 1936 to 1954
Whitland, west Wales, opened in 1911 as United Dairies, handled 1 million litres of milk per day,[141] then Unigate from 1959.[142][143] Was the largest Dairy Crest creamery, produced 17,000 tonnes of butter per year, and also made yoghurt.[144][145] It closed unexpectedly on 1 November 1994, which was quite a controversial decision [146][147]
Castledawson, Nestlé condensed milk plant, opened in 1948, the third Nestlé creamery in Northern Ireland, closed in December 1975
Chippenham Creamery, in Wiltshire, Nestlé made condensed milk
Cuddington, Eddisbury, central Cheshire, west of Northwich, made Ski yoghurt for Express Dairy Foods (Eden Vale); Ski yoghurt had 45% of UK production in the 1970s;[151] Paul Kewan set up Swiss Milk Products in 1963, being bought by Express Dairy Group (Express Dairies) in 1964; the Horners Creamery opened a yoghurt factory on Warrington Road in April 1967 to supply Scotland and the north;[152] Nestlé bought Ski Dairy in February 2002 for £145m, and production was moved to Minsterley in Shropshire[153]
Dunragit Creamery, Dumfries, bought by Nestlé from United Creameries, in August 1940,[154] closed at the end of October 1988,[155] and demolished in April 1989[156]
Evercreech, east Somerset, opened in March 1892, was C & G Prideaux, Unigate, St Ivel, Uniq then Greencore, closed in 2018[157][158][159]
Haywards Heath, Burrell Road, West Sussex, Express Dairies Ski Yoghurt plant, Eden Vale, opened in 1966,[160] and closed in 1986[161]
Nestlé Omagh, County Tyrone, made condensed milk from the 1940s, then Nesquik until 1999, when production of Coffee-Mate moved to Dalston in Cumbria; the site was the biggest single employer in Omagh; it was bought by Lakeland Dairies in March 2002;[162] Nestlé condensed milk production moved to the Netherlands in 2003[163]
Paignton, Devon, was Unigate, Uniq closed late 2009, production moved to Evercreech, made trifles[164]
Royal Wootton Bassett, north Wiltshire, south of the M4, was United Dairies, then Unigate, then St Ivel, being the headquarters. It made yoghurt and the 'Gold' margarine, and closed in 2003
Staverton Mill, in Wiltshire, made condensed milk for a former division of Nestlé, from 1897, until 1972, and yoghurt, after Nestlé bought the Chambourcy yoghurt. Made yoghurt until 2004, and has made Shredded Wheat from 2007
Tullygoonigan Condensery, on the A29 road (Northern Ireland), north of Armagh, near the border of County Tyrone and County Armagh; it opened in October 1948, and was officially opened in early May 1949, it made tinned evaporated milk, and butter, for the Co-op[165][166]; it was to close at the end of October 1987, but was bought in November 1987 by Augher Co-operative, to make cheese, known as AMK Foods
Whittington, Shropshire, bought by Express Dairies in 1954, made Eden Vale fresh cream dairy desserts from July 1970[167]
Delivery
Only 3% of milk in the UK is delivered to the door. There was an 80% drop in deliveries when supermarkets began to sell their own milk en masse. The largest commercial deliverer of milk in the UK has around 500,000 customers because there has been a recent upswing in demand for door deliveries.
Production was regulated by the Milk Marketing Board until 1994; its processing division is now Dairy Crest. AHDB Dairy is a central resource for the UK dairy industry.
Environmental impact
The dairy industry is a large source of waterway pollution in the UK. It is linked to half of all farm pollution, largely from the waste produced by cows.[170] This pollution leads to fish kills and general harm to river ecosystems.[171]
Bailey, N. Z. Alison. "Trends in dairy farming and milk production: the cases of the United Kingdom and New Zealand." Achieving sustainable production of milk (Burleigh Dodds Science Publishing, 2017) pp. 301-324.
Crossley, Eric Lomax. The United Kingdom Dairy Industry (1959).
March, M. D., et al. "Current trends in British dairy management regimens." Journal of dairy science 97.12 (2014): 7985-7994. online
Taylor, David. "The English dairy industry, 1860-1930." Economic History Review 29.4 (1976): 585-601. online
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