Jobs boost at Shropshire dairy Nom

TWO HUNDRED jobs will be created in a huge expansion by Shropshire dairy Nom, it was announced today.

The firm is planning to invest more than £100 million in a three-stage investment at its plant in Donnington Wood business park.

Its new plans could see additional production lines introduced, with the operation eventually more than doubling.

Nom currently employs 160 people but could boost that by 200 in the first stage of its expansion alone.

Christoph Wenisch, CEO of Nom International, said: "Nom UK is uniquely placed to build its market share substantially through the opportunities presented by developing our UK manufacturing centre which uses British milk and local labour as well as sustainable production methods and offers significant carbon footprint reduction.

"We have a clear strategy to increase our presence as a major player in the UK short life dairy market and extending the Nom Dairy plant at Telford will see us achieve that.

"There is extensive land on our 24-acre site for the expansion and most of the base infrastructure is in place to process the large additional volumes of British milk that will be required."

The first stage of expansion could be completed within two to three years.

"We are already engaged in discussions with three potential partners. At this stage we are open to what form that co-operation would take. The important thing is that it is beneficial to all parties involved and helps us develop our site more quickly," Mr Wenisch said.

"We will be announcing our financial results, and while they will show an expected deficit in line with a new company that has invested major sums, we have every confidence our strategy will over time deliver attractive returns.

"Development of brand new dairy facilities, with scalable and flexible capacity, will allow us and future partners to capitalise on the growing trend among UK retailers for locally sourced produce, along with generating the opportunity to produce at lowest cost."

Doubling the size of the dairy would enable Nom UK production to go 350 million pots a year to about one billion.

By Business Editor Thom Kennedy