The new joint venture, The British Organic Dairy Company, will focus on the production of key organic dairy products to exploit opportunities in the sector and ride out uncertainties post Brexit world, said Wyke Farms.
Originally announced in July this year, Wyke Farms hoped the collaboration would boost the flagging organic dairy sector, which had been underperforming relative to overall dairy.
Md Richard Clothier said: “This collaboration will create a solid platform to grow sales of organic dairy products and allow it to reach its potential in a growing world market, now and post-Brexit.
‘Grow sales of organic dairy products’
“This alliance brings together quality and excellence in organic dairy production, from the world’s second largest 100% organic milk producer combined with award winning cheddar quality from Wyke Farms – it really is a world beating collaboration.”
The creation of The British Organic Dairy Company means that Wyke Farms will be sourcing all its milk requirements for organic cheese production from OMSCo.
OMSCo will increase its range of specialist organic cheese made by Wyke Farms for export markets and take a share in the ownership of bulk cheddar stocks for a proportion of domestic and export sales.
Richard Hampton, md for the OMSCo, added: “The partnership, within which we both have an equal share, provides us with a focus to grow organic dairy opportunities together.”
‘An exciting development’
“The launch of our business-to-business brand is an exciting development and will enable us to facilitate the sales and marketing of our products under a joint brand identity.”
Hampton said the goal of the partnership was for Wyke Farms and OMSCo to vertically integrate and produce a guaranteed supply of high quality, good value organic dairy products across the globe.
“By working with Wyke Farms we can provide a unique proposition to distributors and retailers and take advantage of growing markets,” said Hampton.
The partnership will see Wyke Farms and OMSCo more than treble their current organic cheese output, which last year topped 1,000t. The firms will target both EU and US sales, they said.