United Dairy Farmers
United Dairy Farmers is a dairy cooperative owned by 1,400 farmer members with an annual turnover approaching £400 million and employing around 1,200 people. The Group’s activities span the food chain – from providing farm inputs and services, to collecting and marketing almost 1 billion litres of its members’ milk per annum, manufacturing an extensive range of dairy products for the retail, food service and food ingredient sectors and distributing these to both domestic and international markets.
United Dairy Farmers is committed to adding sustainable value to its members’ milk through supply chain excellence, consumer led innovation and building strong positions in consumer and ingredients markets.
The co-operative was formed in 1995. Since then the United Group has developed its business interests through organic growth and a series of acquisitions. In 2001 the Group acquired Dale Farm Dairies, subsequently merging this business with Dromona Quality Foods to form Dale Farm Limited, which now has 7 manufacturing sites throughout the UK. An extensive capital investment programme to reduce costs and increase capacity and capability has resulted in processing facilities that are best in class.
The Group businesses include:
Dale Farm – Processes and markets a wide range of dairy products
Dale Farm Ingredients – Supplies dairy based food ingredients to domestic and international markets
Dale Farm Ice Cream – Distributes ice cream products
Dale Farm Lakeland – Manufactures and supplies consumer dairy products, including fresh milk, yogurts, desserts and cottage cheese
Rowan Glen – Manufactures and supplies a range of Scottish yogurts and dairy products.
United Dairy Farmers – Transports, tests and markets ex-farm milk;
United Tankcare – Supplies and maintains on-farm milk tanks;
Dairy Herd Management – Provides milk recording and herd management information; and
United Feeds – Manufactures and supplies animal feeds and other farm inputs.
