Dairy giant vows to invest more in Shropshire
Bosses of dairy giant Müller Wiseman have pledged to invest more money into Shropshire following the opening of Britain's biggest butter plant.
The £17 million factory has been built at the dairy in Shrewsbury Road, Market Drayton – bringing with it 100 jobs.
The plant has been in operation since last month, but a formal opening ceremony featuring Environment Secretary Owen Paterson, the MP for North Shropshire, and Theo Müller Snr, owner of the Müller Group, was held yesterday morning.
At the event Herr Müller pointed to recent investments as evidence of his company's ambitions.
These have included acquiring fresh milk processor Müller Wiseman Dairies, a chilled desserts factory in Minsterley, near Shrewsbury, and Nom UK's yoghurt manufacturing site in Telford.
Company bosses also revealed plans to invest a further £45 million to £50 million across the group, including about £5 million at its Telford site next year.
The company is looking to extend the range of products made at the butter plant, which will initially manufacture 25kg and 10kg blocks of salted, unsalted and lactic butter for the food manufacturing and food ingredient industries.
It is also accelerating plans to install a packet butter operation so that it can also offer 250 gram products to the retail and food service sectors from next summer.
Herr Müller said: "By investing in new products and highly efficient manufacturing facilities, we aim to offer customers the means by which their consumers can access great dairy products made in Britain with milk produced by British dairy farmers."
Ronald Kers, chief executive of the Müller UK & Ireland Group, said: "This represents a major opportunity for well invested dairy companies in the UK and for dairy farmers in Britain."
Mr Paterson, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, said: "The new £17 million butter plant is a typically bold venture by Müller and a massive step towards delivering our priorities.
"It is also excellent news for local dairy farmers and a great credit to the skilled Market Drayton workforce who have played such a key role in this national success story."
About 70 guests attended yesterday's event, which included a tour of the new plant. One of the guests was Councillor Tim Beckett, mayor of Market Drayton, who also works for the company.
He said: "It is great for the town and it is great they are keeping it local. I was very impressed."
