James and Chloe Davidson are keeping it local with the home-supply milk business.
If you don’t remember yourself, you’ll have either heard your parents reminiscing about it or you would have seen the numerous examples popping up around New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom over the past year.
Early morning door-to-door deliveries of delicious milk, in returnable glass bottles, is on its way back! And the first stop is Darfield, Canterbury.
This month our family will launch our new business and begin delivering glass bottles of delicious, batch pasteurised, A2 milk to the doorsteps of Canterbury homes.
It’s been a long time coming, with James for the last couple of years, using the wall of our shower as his brainstorming whiteboard! It’s fair to say that we have gone through a few pads of waterproof paper.
While definitely not a mainstream approach to dairy farming, we want the milk that our customers drink to be of the highest quality with minimal processing and reaching the highest environmental and animal welfare standards.
Each and every step has been well thought out and we as a family are diving in boots and all. As with most business ventures, we have hit a number of road blocks but we are extremely driven and are focused on making our dream a reality.
Until a few months ago, we were still in the dream phase but now that we are so close to launching, we are extremely excited and cannot wait for that first delivery.
From day one, our goal has been to be completely transparent and provide Kiwi families with the knowledge of exactly where their milk comes from. We want families to know that the milk they are giving their children has only been handled by us and has come straight from our farm to their fridge.
Another goal of ours has been to, where possible, keep everything local. The journey of our one-litre glass bottle of milk begins in a local Woolston business where it is then hand-delivered to the screen printers in Sydenham, just down the road.
We then pick the bottles up and take them back to the farm where we milk our small herd of Shorthorn and Jersey cows on a portable milking trailer just out of Darfield. We then batch-pasteurise the milk and hand-bottle it all before storing it in the chiller ready to be delivered the next day. It’s a simple journey, and we intend to keep it that way.
The last focus for us has been on keeping cows with their calves and ensuring that the land we farm off is regeneratively farmed and free of chemicals and pesticides. While definitely not a mainstream approach to dairy farming, we want the milk that our customers drink to be of the highest quality with minimal processing and reaching the highest environmental and animal welfare standards.
We will start close to home initially and open deliveries up to Darfield homes, but intend to break into West Melton and Rolleston soon after.
Christchurch is a little further away, but we are very keen to build a customer base. We have aligned ourselves with our favourite local cafe who have similar values to us and who also like to support local. We can’t wait to see their customers enjoying our delicious milk.
The café will also be our exclusive supplier for customers who either want to run in quickly and buy a bottle or two to try, or for those who are outside our delivery catchment.
As we write we are almost ready to launch our boutique milk business so make sure you keep your eyes peeled for updates on social media.
- Check out Roan Milk at www.roan.co.nz and on twitter @roanfarm
