Source: Radio New Zealand
Bella Vacca Jerseys co-founder Gavin Hogarth shows Daisy the dairy cow the end product of her efforts. Peter de Graaf
A Northland business leading the way back to the future by selling milk straight from the farm in glass bottles is the latest to fall victim to soaring fuel prices and global uncertainty.
Bella Vacca Jerseys, founded in 2016 by sharemilkers Gavin Hogarth and Jody Hansen, supplied homes, cafes and retailers as far away as Auckland from their farm near Moerewa.
Their milk was pasteurised on-farm and was sold in one-litre glass bottles that were washed and re-used up to 50 times.
The business also supplied cafes with milk in re-useable plastic pails, and claimed to have reduced New Zealand’s consumption of single-use plastic bottles by 250,000 per year.
However, the last bottles of Bella Vacca milk were delivered last Friday.
Northland sharemilkers Gavin Hogarth and Jody Hansen founded Bella Vacca Jerseys to supply milk straight from the farm in glass bottles. Peter de Graaf
Hogarth said a combination of soaring fuel prices, global uncertainty caused by the Iran war, and challenging weather had forced the decision.
“The biggest thing that really pushed the button was the cost of fuel. The vehicles went from costing $90 to fill up to around $240,” he said.
“We always found it hard, having to increase prices. We worked out one day how much we’d need to put the price up. Well, a week later, it wasn’t enough, because fuel was just accelerating that fast.”
Northland’s wet summer and autumn also played a part.
The couple welcomed the rainy start to the season at first – recurring droughts are the bane of many a Northland dairy farmer – but then the rain kept coming.
“There’s just no way that we could milk cows during the winter. We’ve still got paddocks we’re trying to get grass seed back into after the maize came off. It’s just so wet.”
They had tried to find an alternative supply of Jersey milk but farmers in their area were tied up with contracts to big dairy companies.
Hogarth said the business was, in a way, a victim of its own success.
They needed to expand to meet demand but ageing power infrastructure, in particular a 90-year-old earth line, meant they couldn’t run any more machinery.
To expand or branch into new products, such as gelato, they would need to set up a new factory off-farm.
“A couple of buildings came up that we could have bought and fitted out. But it’s not the right time to be going out and raising that sort of money, given the crisis we’re looking at in the world right now.”
Hogarth said the business had built up a loyal following during the past 10 years, and had received many heart-felt messages, including hand-written notes from children, since the final delivery was announced.
Reading those was both gratifying and difficult, he said.
“Our milk was pretty popular in that respect. And it’s probably made more people aware of what real food is. That’s a blunt way of saying it, I suppose.
“It costs more than normal milk. But once people tried it, they realised why it costs more, because it was completely different.”
Hogarth said the large dairy companies had to pasteurise their milk quickly and at higher temperatures due to the volumes they were working with.
“Whereas we would do it at a much lower temperature for 10 minutes. And because of that, it retains so much more of the flavour and texture of real milk.”
The business was for sale and a few potential buyers had shown interest, so Hogarth was still hopeful it could be revived under new owners.
Even if the war on Iran ended tomorrow, he expected the costs faced by small Northland businesses to keep going up.
“Each day they’re getting closer to making the decision. It’s tough out there, and the unknown is probably the biggest thing.”
The final deliveries took place last Friday.
Bella Vacca’s milk was used by cafes across Northland and Auckland, and for making gelato sold at Devonport’s Victoria Cinema.
Home deliveries were focused on Auckland suburbs where initial orders were strongest.
In an earlier interview, co-founder Jody Hansen said they started Bella Vacca Jerseys after a drop in Fonterra’s milk payout in 2016.
That had forced her to seek accounting work off-farm to make ends meet, and prompted the couple to rethink the business.
They wanted some control over their income instead of being “price-takers”, but knew they could not compete with supermarkets on price.
Instead, they opted for glass bottles and on-farm production, both as a point of difference and to reduce plastic waste.
Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
