 | |
| Company type | Public |
|---|---|
| Industry | Foods |
| Founded | 1959 |
| Headquarters | Gerrards Cross, UK |
Key people | Ross Warburton, Chairman Geoff Eaton, CEO |
| Revenue | £736.1 million (2007) |
| £(3.6) million (2007) | |
| £(41.7) million (2007) | |
Number of employees | 6,559 (2007) |
| Parent | Greencore |
| Website | |
Uniq plc (formerly Unigate plc) was a British food manufacturer. Listed on the London Stock Exchange and once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index, it was taken over by Irish foods conglomerate Greencore in 2011.
The company was formed in 1959 by the merger of the UK's largest dairy products company United Dairies, with Cow & Gate, earlier known as the West Surrey Central Dairy Company, [1] forming Unigate.
On merger, aside from its extensive milk home delivery network, its range of food products included Cow & Gate baby foods (now part of Royal Numico) and Farmer’s Wife cream. It also developed St Ivel cheese spreads and Utterly Butterly.
In 1963, Unigate acquired Midland Counties Dairies, but as milk consumption levelled and then started to decline in the 1960s, it began diversifying into non-dairy businesses. It began by buying up grocery stores and restaurants, and by the 1970s bought supermarket chain Kibby's, Quids-In clothing shops, Uni-Wash laundrettes, and some Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises. In 1973, it acquired Scot Bowyers, a meat-processing company, in 1975 United States–based Italian cheese manufacturer Frigo, and in 1978 US specialty cheesemaker, Gardenia.
In 1977, dairyman John Clement became CEO and chairman. To stop the decline in the dairy business, he sold 75% of its dairy manufacturing businesses to the nationalised company the Milk Marketing Board for £87 million. After paying off debt, Unigate acquired:
But the diversification did not help the balance sheet, and in the late 1980s the project was reversed. By the end of the decade, despite Unigate remaining the UK's biggest milk supplier, dairy products only made up one third of group turnover. With losses mounting and debt rising, Clement was replaced in both board positions by the end of 1991.
In the following decade, Unigate focused on food and distribution, selling off non-core and unprofitable businesses, which raised £700 million. Half of this came through the £332 million sale of its share in Nutricia, the holding company that owned the Cow & Gate brand. The company also bought brands to supplement its new direction, spending £400 million on French firms Prodipal, a maker of yogurts and desserts, and Vedial, a maker of spreads. In September 1996, Unigate paid £77.25 million for the UK and Italian margarine and spreads business of Kraft Foods International, including Vitalite. [3]
In May 1998, the company attempted an unsuccessful £1.59 billion takeover of diversified conglomerate Hillsdown Holdings. In February 1999 the company did acquire Fisher Quality Foods, a UK supplier of sauces, dressings, and marinades, from the Albert Fisher Group for £43 million. In the meantime, Hillsdown under shareholder pressure had begun a break-up, spinning off its chilled convenience food subsidiary as Terranova. In March 1999, Unigate initiated a hostile £228.5 million takeover bid for Terranova, which was accepted after the bid was raised to £274 million.
But by the late 1990s, the decline in doorstep deliveries and price pressure from supermarkets led to mounting losses, and in 2000 the milk and cheese division was sold to Dairy Crest. [4] On completion of the sale, the company changed its name to Uniq in July 2000. [5] In 2001, it demerged Wincanton, its logistics subsidiary, by way of an initial public offering. [1]
It sold its yoghurt business in 2002 to raise money to concentrate on the convenience foods market. [6] In March 2009 Uniq reached an agreement for the sale of its UK chilled fish business, Pinneys of Scotland, to The Seafood Company Ltd (part of the Foodvest Group). [7]
On 12 July 2011, Greencore announced it intended to buy Uniq. [8] The deal was completed in November 2011, and Uniq is now subsumed within the operations of Greencore.
The company has sites in Spalding (Smedley's Salads prepared salads), Northampton, Evercreech (former St Ivel site), Minsterley in Shropshire (former site of Northern Foods until May 2004) and Paignton (produces all of Cadbury's chilled desserts such as chocolate mousses). The Northampton site produces most of Marks & Spencer's and Morrisons' prepared sandwiches.
Glanbia plc is a company that owns several consumer brands that produce lifestyle products such as food supplements. Glanbia is headquartered in Kilkenny, Ireland with over 5,534 employees in over 30 countries around the world. Glanbia’s consumer brands and ingredients are sold or distributed in over 130 countries. North America is the company’s largest market, and it also has a presence in Europe, Middle East, Asia Pacific and Latin America. Glanbia's primary listing is on Euronext Dublin. Glanbia comprises three divisions: Glanbia Nutritionals, Glanbia Performance Nutrition and Joint Ventures.
Greencore Group plc is a food company in Ireland. It was established by the Irish government in 1991, when Irish Sugar was privatised, but today Greencore's products are mainly convenience foods, not only in Ireland but also in the United Kingdom. A major supplier to British and Irish supermarkets, Greencore is the largest sandwich manufacturer in the world. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.
Wincanton is a town and electoral ward in South Somerset, southwest England. The town lies off the A303 road, a main route between London and South West England, and has some light industry. In the 2021 census the civil parish had a population of 6,568.
Saputo Dairy UK, formerly Dairy Crest Limited, is a British dairy products company. It was created in 2019 when the Canadian company Saputo Inc bought Dairy Crest. Dairy Crest itself was created in 1981 as a spin-off of the Milk Marketing Board. Its brands include Saputo Dairy UK, Cathedral City Cheddar Cheese, Country Life Butter, Utterly Butterly, Vitalite and Clover.
Northern Foods is a British food manufacturer headquartered in Wakefield, England. It was formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the original FTSE 100 Index. The company is credited, together with Marks & Spencer, with creating the UK Chilled Food category. The driver of this growth was Christopher Haskins, the son-in-law of the company's founder Alec Horsley. Haskins became a director in 1967, deputy chairman in 1974, and was chairman from 1980 to 2002. The company was delisted in 2011 when it was bought by the 2 Sisters company.
Premier Foods plc is a British food manufacturer headquartered in St Albans, Hertfordshire. The group owns many well-known brands, including Mr Kipling, Ambrosia, Bird's Custard, Angel Delight, Homepride cooking sauces, Lyons, Sharwood's, Loyd Grossman sauces, Oxo, Bisto, Batchelors and Plantastic. Premier Foods also produce cakes under the Cadbury's name, using the brand under licence. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.
Kraft Foods Inc. was a multinational confectionery, food and beverage conglomerate. It marketed many brands in more than 170 countries. Twelve of its brands annually earned more than $1 billion worldwide: Cadbury, Jacobs, Kraft, LU, Maxwell House, Milka, Nabisco, Oreo, Oscar Mayer, Philadelphia, Trident, and Tang. Forty of its brands were at least a century old.
Borden, Inc., was an American producer of food and beverage products, consumer products, and industrial products. At one time, the company was the largest U.S. producer of dairy and pasta products. Its food division, Borden Foods, was based in Columbus, Ohio, and focused primarily on pasta and pasta sauces, bakery products, snacks, processed cheese, jams and jellies, and ice cream. It was best known for its Borden Ice Cream, Meadow Gold milk, Creamette pasta, and Borden Condensed Milk brands. Its consumer products and industrial segment marketed wallpaper, adhesives, plastics and resins. By 1993, sales of food products accounted for 67 percent of its revenue. It was also known for its Elmer's and Krazy Glue brands.
Strauss Group Ltd., formerly known as Strauss-Elite, is an Israeli manufacturer and marketer of consumer foods sold through retail stores. It is among the largest food manufacturers in Israel. Strauss Group focuses on dairy products, coffee, water, snacks, salads, and dips. Its subsidiary Strauss Coffee is a leading coffee company in Eastern Europe and Brazil. Strauss Group is a public company traded in the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, with the majority of its shares (57%) being owned by the Strauss family.
St Ivel is a brand of dairy products in the United Kingdom, introduced in 1901 by the Yeovil-based dairy company Aplin & Barrett, for use on a range of their products. The company was taken over by Unigate Dairy Company in 1960. Most production sites were in the south west of England and some in Wales. Most of its brands were bought in the beginning of the 2000s by Dairy Crest, following a severe decline in doorstep deliveries of milk – previously a major area of business for Unigate. In 2020 the St Ivel brand was still used for buttermilk produced by Dairy Crest's successor Müller.
Express Dairies is a former brand of Dairy Crest, that specialised almost entirely in home deliveries of milk, and other dairy products.
Wincanton plc is a British provider of logistics with its origins in milk haulage. The company provides transport and logistics services including specialist automated high bay, high capacity warehouses, and supply chain management for businesses. The company was listed on the London Stock Exchange until it was acquired by GXO Logistics in April 2024.
Cranswick plc is a leading UK food producer and supplier of premium, fresh and added-value food products. The company is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.
Groupe Lactalis S.A. is a French multinational dairy products corporation, owned by the Besnier family and based in Laval, Mayenne, France. The company's former name was Besnier S.A.
Cow & Gate was a British dairy products company which expanded into milk bottling, distribution, and baby food production. It merged in 1959 with United Dairies to form Unigate plc, which today is known as Uniq plc. The Cow & Gate brand survives as a specialist baby food brand, owned by Netherlands-based Numico, now owned by Danone.
The Bega Group is an Australian diversified food and drinks company with manufacturing sites in New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and Victoria. Founded as an agricultural cooperative in the town of Bega, New South Wales by their dairy suppliers, it became a public company in 2011 when it listed on the Australian Securities Exchange. Close to half of shares publicly traded are still held by Bega's farmer-suppliers. It is currently one of the largest companies in the dairy sector in Australia, with a base milk supply in 2018 of approximately 750 million litres per annum.
Tirlán is an Irish dairy co-operative based in Kilkenny, Ireland. Its catchment area mainly covers the South-East and Midland regions of Ireland.Tirlán processes an annual volume of 3.2 billion litres of milk and handles 190,000 tonnes of green grain.
First Milk is a dairy co-operative in Britain which manufactures cheese, specialist dairy ingredients and whey proteins for its customers, as well as providing traceable fresh milk to a range of dairy manufacturers and food processors. As a dairy co-operative, owned and run by farmers; the area covered by its milk pool runs from the Mull of Kintyre in Scotland down through England and Wales.
Granarolo S.p.A. is a food company in Italy founded in 1957 and based in Bologna. It operates in the fresh milk and dairy-cheese sector, dry pasta, deli meats and vegetable foods.
The Davidstow Creamery is a manufacturing plant in Cornwall; it makes Cathedral City mature Cheddar cheese. It is the largest cheese factory in the UK, and the largest mature cheddar plant in the world. 50% of all milk in Cornwall goes to the site.
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