Welsh Frozen Yoghurt Producer Receives Royal Recognition
North Wales frozen yogurt producer, Plas Farm, is celebrating being named winner of the UK’s highest accolade for business success – The Queen’s Award For Enterprise. The Anglesey-based company, which has customers worldwide, is to receive its award for its excellence in International Trade in recognition of its increased year on year export sales.
The prestigious awards are made annually by Her Majesty The Queen, and are only given for the highest levels of excellence demonstrated in each category.
David Williams (pictured), director and founder of Plas Farmm, says: “This award puts Plas Farm among an elite group of UK companies. It will be a tremendous boost to us and a sign to our customers of the quality of our frozen yogurt and of our business achievements.”
Originating in the USA, creamy, yet fat-free, frozen yogurt has become an international dairy success story, and Plas Farm has become the sector’s European leader.
From its 18,000 sq ft purpose-built base at Gaerwen the company makes a range of frozen yogurt products including soft mix yogurt for use in soft serve machines, frozen yogurt for smoothies, yogurt portions for blending and scooping yogurts for both foodservice and retail.
Plas Farm has been producing frozen yogurt for more than 30 years, when dairy farmer David Williams switched to producing chilled yogurts and cheeses. Now the company has a £2 million turnover and employs 20 full-time staff.
“We have doubled our production over the past two years and export sales have increased from around 5% of our turnover to about 40%,” adds David Williams. “The sector has really taken off, indeed the frozen yogurt market inEuropewas almost ten times bigger in 2013 as it was in 2008. For us the biggest export markets are Sweden, Ireland, Germany, Pakistan and Cyprus, and we also have customers also in Tanzania, Greece, Spain, Norway, France, and Qatar.”
The growth in export orders has coincided with the company’s increased activity at international and trade events, taking the opportunity to exhibit under auspices of the Welsh Government’s Food & Drink Wales banner and stand at events such as Anuga in Cologne and SIAL in Paris and last month’s Food & Drink Expo in Birmingham.
