Dairy Crest

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Dairy Crest Group plc

Type	Public (London Stock Exchange: DCG)
Founded	1933 (as the Milk Marketing Board)
Headquarters	Esher, Surrey, UK
Key people	Simon Oliver, Chairman Mark Allen, Chief Executive
Industry	Dairy food
Products	Cathedral City (cheese) FRijj Clover Petits Filous
Revenue	£1,355.2m [[1]]
Employees	7000
Website	www.dairycrest.co.uk

Dairy Crest Group plc is a major dairy products company in the United Kingdom. Its brands include Cathedral City cheese (which is made in Davidstow, a place in Cornwall which is not a City and does not have a Cathedral), Utterly Butterly, Vitalite, Clover, St Ivel and FRijj. They also deliver milk to around 1.1 million households via their milkmen.

Since 1981, Dairy Crest was originally the brand name of the government body or quango known as the Milk Marketing Board and was privatised in August 1996. In July 2000, it acquired the dairy and cheese products division of Unigate (based near the BBC in London). In November 2002, it acquired the St Ivel spreads company (based in Wootton Bassett in Wiltshire). In September 2004, they acquired the Country Life butter brand from English Butter Marketing Company. In July 2006, it acquired Express Dairies from Arla Foods for £33m.

Since 1991, Dairy Crest has had a joint venture with French dairy company Yoplait called Yoplait Dairy Crest (often abbreviated to YDC) which is 51% owned by Yoplait and 49% by Dairy Crest. The company distributes Yoplait brand products in the UK.

1 Cheese
2 Spreads
3 Drinks
4 Production sites
5 External links

[edit] Cheese

It produces several brands of cheese. The most popular one is Cathedral City, a brand of cheddar cheese produced at Davidstow in Cornwall, from a 25 year old recipe. It is currently the most popular brand of cheddar cheese in the UK. Dairy Crest bought the brand from Mendip Foods Ltd in 1995.

Other cheese brands include Davidstow, the Hartington brand of Blue Stilton and Wexford.

[edit] Spreads

St.Ivel Gold is a low fat spread that was launched in 1977 by St Ivel and became popular for being lower in fat than other brands.

Originally a Kraft then St Ivel brand, Vitalite is a sunflower spread which is known for its Smiling Sun which was part of a famous advertising campaign, with a song rhyming Vitalite. Empty Vitalite tubs are also popular for being used as bowls for feeding pets.

Utterly Butterly is a brand that is made from buttermilk, there is also a Scandinavian variant. It is a sponsor of a wing walking team.

Willow is a churned buttermilk-based spread, which is sold as 250g blocks. Other brands include Golden Churn, Country Life (formerly owned by English Butter) and Clover.

The butters and Clover are made in Crudgington in Telford, and the other spreads such as Gold are made in Kirkby in north Merseyside.

[edit] Drinks

FRijj is a milkshake drink. It is typically sold in 500ml curvy bottles. Flavours include chocolate, banana, strawberry, vanilla and white chocolate. There are also limited edition flavours featuring characters from The Simpsons. These are typically available for a few months at at time. The following flavour/character combinations have been released: banoffee pie (Krusty the Klown); raspberry doughnut (Homer Simpson); mint chocolate (Mr Burns); chocolate fudge brownie (Chief Wiggum). The current limited edition, raspberry, is not associated with any character, and used to be part of the standard range. By popular demand, chocolate fudge brownie has become a permanent flavour.

[edit] Production sites

The main production sites in the UK are in Chadwell Heath, close to the A12 which bottles much of the milk for London, and at Severnside in Stonehouse in Gloucestershire, close to junction 13 of the M5.