Breeo Foods has sold the ice cream business of its distribution subsidiary Superchill to Northern Ireland dairy company Dale Farm. Laura Slatteryreports.
Breeo, which is the consumer foods division of former Dairygold subsidiary Reox Holdings, has left the ice cream business as a result of the sale, which will give Dale Farm distribution rights to Mars and Häagen-Dazs ice cream in the west of Ireland.
Superchill's ice-cream turnover from its bases in Galway and Letterkenny is well in excess of €1 million a year.
It also acted as a sub-distributor of Cadbury and Nestlé ice cream products for Dale Farm, which holds the exclusive all-island distribution rights to those brands.
The price of the transaction was not disclosed. Dale Farm is owned by the Ulster Dairy Farmers co-operative and last year had sales of £134 million and reported a profit of £585,000. Its ice cream business, Dale Farm Ice Cream, had sales of £5.89 million and profits of £215,000, according to accounts filed with the Northern Ireland companies office.
Dale Farm said yesterday that its sales had not suffered as a result of the unseasonably wet weather this summer, thanks to a strong start to the season during a warm April.
Through its luxury Belgian chocolate-coated ice cream brand Rapture, the group is also gaining ground in the premium end of the ice cream market, which is less dependent on the weather.
Ice cream sales are ahead of last summer, which was a record year for the group, according to a spokeswoman.
Dale Farm now hopes to develop its ice cream distribution business in the Republic by extending the Mars and Häagen-Dazs distribution rights to other parts of the country.
The group has invested more than £40 million across its operations in the UK in the last five years.
A spokesman for Breeo said ice cream had not been a core area for the company, which owns the Dairygold, Shaws, Galtee, Sno, Mitchelstown and Calvita brands.
Superchill will now focus on developing "front-of-shop" sales of smoothies, sandwiches and salads for Breeo under its beverage brand Be and the Dublin-only snack brand Bellini & Blake.
