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What you need to do next to grow.

Farm-based, artisan, family and scaling producers

Farm-based, artisan, family and scaling producers. The provenance and premium analysis, the suppliers who work at your scale, the forums, and a plain route from where you are now to the next stage.

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What matters now

Three things worth your attention.

Market

Cheddar rises 9% in a month and still trails the milk price

What changed
Mild Cheddar gained £270 a tonne in September, more than any other product AHDB tracks, and cheese is back above butter and powder at the factory gate.
Why it matters
The October milk price rises were announced weeks before that figure was published, and AHDB says Cheddar prices remain too low to cover them.
What to watch
Whether November milk price announcements move again before the next AHDB wholesale assessment, and whether contract cheese prices follow the spot trades.

Members · Analysis · 29 September 2026

Regulation

The invoice arrives this autumn. Nobody can tell you what it says.

What changed
Year-two extended producer responsibility is priced on recyclability, and the confirmed fees are not published until November.
Why it matters
Packaging with missing recyclability data is rated red by default, so 100 tonnes rated red for want of an assessment costs £13,000 more than the same tonnage rated green.
What to watch
PackUK's confirmed year-two fees and the first Notice of Liability, both due by the end of November.

Members · Analysis · 22 September 2026

Analysis

UK Cheese to 2030

What changed
The growth you own, and the growth you rent. Where the repeat demand actually is, what the evidence will and won't support, and the numbers the category should stop trusting.
Why it matters
The fastest-growing line on the cheese shelf is premium own-label Cheddar, up 20.5% in volume while branded Cheddar fell 4.7%; the growth worth funding to 2030 is repeat demand that survives promotions, waste and fulfilment, not branded volume rented at the expense of the retailer's own label.

Analysis · 29 October 2026

Grow my dairy business

Where are you now?

Eight stages from starting out to looking for investment. Pick yours and see what to work through next, and which insight, partners, recognition and rooms are relevant. Not a sales funnel: GROW is one option among several.

Where are you now? Pick your stage

Intelligence

Provenance, premium and scaling.

Independent pieces on PDO (protected designation of origin) and provenance, artisan scaling, brand and the counter. Filter by topic.

Members · Analysis · 10 min read

Cheddar rises 9% in a month and still trails the milk price

Mild Cheddar rose 9% in September, taking a litre made into Cheddar and whey to 39.08 pence and putting cheese back above butter and powder at the factory gate, but the October milk price rises were announced weeks before that figure was published, and AHDB says Cheddar prices remain too low to cover them.

29 September 2026

Members · Analysis · 7 min read

The invoice arrives this autumn. Nobody can tell you what it says.

The most expensive packaging decision available to a mid-sized processor this year is not a material decision at all: packaging with missing recyclability data is rated red, so 100 tonnes rated red by default rather than by design costs £13,000 more than the same tonnage rated green. That is larger than the gap between a realistic pack mix and a perfect one.

22 September 2026

Close-up of a screen showing volatile red and green financial trend lines

Members · Analysis · 4 min read

2026 the volatility year

2026 will not be the recovery year the sector expected but the year that resets it, splitting shoppers into clearer tiers and leaving mainstream Cheddar the most exposed.

27 April 2026

A supermarket cheese chiller packed with vacuum-wrapped blocks of Cheddar and other hard cheeses

Members · Analysis · 24 min read

UK Cheese to 2030

The fastest-growing line on the cheese shelf is premium own-label Cheddar, up 20.5% in volume while branded Cheddar fell 4.7%; the growth worth funding to 2030 is repeat demand that survives promotions, waste and fulfilment, not branded volume rented at the expense of the retailer's own label.

29 October 2026

An empty white plate with a knife and fork on a bright orange table

Members · Report · 15 min read

The Next Plate

The dairy majors have built their plans on protein while Mars has moved on to fibre, AI and the solo meal; none of them has yet made the meal for one, and especially the older one, a dairy occasion, and that is the opening for UK and Irish dairy.

28 October 2026

A cheeseboard of British farmhouse cheeses, including a blue, a Red Leicester and a clothbound hard cheese, with figs and grapes

Members · Analysis · 5 min read

What happens to the Christmas cheeseboard in January

Christmas puts more farmhouse cheese in front of supermarket shoppers, but whether it grows choice depends on whether they can find and recognise the same cheese in January, and nobody publishes the repeat-purchase figure that would show it.

27 October 2026

A group of older friends laughing together over their smartphones

Members · Report · 37 min read

The Longevity Economy

The opportunity is not a product labelled for older people but a portfolio redesigned around the nutritional, functional and experiential needs of longer lives, with value growth more plausible than broad volume growth.

19 October 2026

The Protein Plant

Members · Report · 17 min read

The Protein Plant

The finding that matters most for boards is about information, not plant: Britain publishes a value for whey sold as powder but none for whey fractionated into concentrates, isolates and specialised proteins, and a board cannot compare a route it cannot price.

7 October 2026

A supermarket chiller of cheese, yoghurts and protein yoghurts, with shelf price labels

Members · Report · 10 min read

The Unclaimed Protein

The Protein Series settled where the protein market is going; the decisions it leaves a dairy business are where to compete on the price ladder, which claim a formulation can legally carry, which of four positions to take, and how to tell whether it is working.

5 October 2026

Brief · 2 min read

The three numbers in your packaging budget are last year's

Year-two EPR resets the rate and starts charging on recyclability, so the number worth working out this month is not tonnage times rate but the red, amber and green split, and how much of the red is red only because an assessment was never submitted.

21 September 2026

Three men holding a trophy and rosette at the Cheese Dairy Deli Expo awards backdrop

News · 2 min read

ICDA 2026: the retail and foodservice winners at a glance

Waitrose & Partners dominated the 2026 retail titles with six categories, while Booths claimed Supreme Cheese Retailer.

26 June 2026

Chunks of crumbled white feta cheese on a blue-grey plate

Members · Analysis · 3 min read

FETA PDO: provenance the buyer can verify

With speciality cheese outgrowing the category and feta supply tightening, buyers should secure genuine PDO product early rather than treat it as a commodity.

19 June 2026

All Provenance & Premium analysis →

Expertise

Suppliers who work at artisan and SME scale.

From the Dairy Connect Connect Directory, matched on expertise. Ordered by match, then by profile completeness, then alphabetically. Never by payment.

No Connect Directory listing matches your area yet.

Search the Connect Directory

Events

Is this worth your time?

Cork · 3 & 4 March 2027

Dairy Forum Ireland

Relevant to

Technical & Processing, Leadership & Strategy, Commercial & Sales, Artisan & SME

Why attend

How do we create more value from dairy? Twelve speakers follow milk from the farm to the market, each session closing on a chaired industry challenge. Opens with an evening of cheese and whiskey.

View programmeWho’s it for?Get your free ticket

GROW by Dairy Connect

When growth needs diagnosing, not just marketing.

GROW is one route among several on this page, not the destination. Where your business is scaling faster than its margin, capacity or compliance, the fact-finding workshop finds the constraint that actually binds.

GROW

Market readiness

Test whether the product, pricing, packaging, capacity and commercial model are ready for the opportunity the business wants to pursue.

GROW

Retail listing consultancy

Strengthen the buyer proposition, pricing story and presentation while ensuring the business is operationally and technically prepared to win, and to service, a listing.

GROW

Compliance and technical readiness

Identify gaps in specifications, quality systems, traceability, accreditation, claims, labelling and buyer requirements before they become barriers.

How GROW works

Not quite your role?

Nine roles, each with its own route. Or tell us what you are trying to solve and we will point you to the right people.

Explore by roleSpeak to the team