250 jobs saved at milk supplier (From Daily Echo)

250 jobs saved at milk supplier

3:30pm Saturday 5th May 2012 in Business By Matt Smith , Politics and business reporter

MORE than 250 staff at a Southampton milk supplier are celebrating after their jobs were secured by a dairy farmer buying a major stake in the business.

Pensworth is now looking to a bright future after substantial investment from Cambridge-based Plumbs’ Dairy.

Now, Pensworth plans to relaunch doorstep deliveries in Southampton later this year.

The firm, which has an annual turnover of £40m, processes around 66 million litres of milk a year and is one of the largest UK suppliers.

Now, bosses are hoping to increase turnover to £50m in the next three years, which could create up to 25 new jobs.

Arthur Dunne, who heads Pensworth’s management team, said the firm, which delivers to around 100,000 doorsteps across the south, was planning to resume doorstep rounds in Southampton in the autumn after they stopped eight years ago.

It is also planning to expand production of its smaller plastic milk bottles for schools. Around 330,000 are now being sent out each week after they were launched 18 months ago.

Pensworth has a head office and processing factory in Bevois Valley, Southampton, as well as regional depots servicing the whole of the south of England and south Wales for both doorstep and wholesale customers including schools, care homes, hotels and restaurants.

Around a quarter of its milk is supplied in traditional glass bottles.

Plumbs’ Dairy owner Bernard Plumb decided to invest in the business to secure its future after its owner, Roger Bishop, died last year.

Mr Plumb, who raised the finance through a TSB loan and personal savings, said: “I have been a dairyman for over 45 years and believe passionately in the doorstep deliveries and local milk supplies.”

Established as a family partnership in Salisbury, Wiltshire in 1975, Pensworth established its processing operation in Southampton with the purchase of the Vines factory in Empress Road, in 2001. Staff have relocated to a new adjacent head office over the past six months.

Pensworth has quadrupled in size in the past five years and now directly supports 400 jobs, including its own staff.

It has diversified in recent years to supply additional products to customers such as Hovis bread from Eastleigh, as well as eggs, flavoured milk, yoghurts, juices and cream.