Arla Foods invests €210 million in UK for mozzarella
Image: Arla Foods
Farmer-owned Arla Foods, one of the world’s largest mozzarella producers, has announced its largest ever investment into the UK at the Taw Valley dairy in southwestern England.
The €210 million investment at the European dairy cooperative’s Taw Valley site in the UK, enables Arla Foods to even better meet increasingly specific demands from key customers and keep pace in the fast-moving space of global mozzarella, secure competitiveness and deliver growth in the category as outlined in the company’s Future26 strategy, according to the company.
“Our mozzarella business has seen double-digit growth over the past five years and we have strong relationships with key customers, particularly in global foodservice, and it’s from that very solid starting point we are announcing the investment,” says executive vice president and COO, Peter Giørtz-Carlsen. He continues, “But we also know that we have to work hard to maintain that position among the global leaders in the category and deliver on our strategy. This investment allows us to stay among the leaders within mozzarella, serve our customers even better and at the same time improve profitability for our farmer owners’ milk.”
The investment technology includes several patents and brings down the maturing process from 14 days to just one.
“With this investment, Taw Valley will become a state-of-the-art cheese production site and combined with our strong channel understanding in the global mozzarella category, we are strengthening further our business,” says executive vice president and head of supply chain, David Boulanger.
The cheese produced at Taw Valley will add in-demand volumes to Arla Foods’ current mozzarella production and the majority of it will be exported to global foodservice customers around the world underlining the dairy cooperatives role as a key global player in the category.
Construction is expected to be finalised in 2026 with the first products from the new facility ready the following year. The investment will have no impact on Arla Foods’ two other mozzarella production sites in Denmark.
