MACKIE’S of Scotland has invested £250,000 in new machinery that will produce the lids for its two litre tubs of ice cream.
The new machinery will come alongside a £50,000 extension at the firm’s factory, allowing for all of the components of the ice cream tubs to be made in Aberdeenshire.
Previously, the tubs were shipped from Sweden to Aberdeenshire – amounting to a total travel distance of 1750 miles.
Gerry Stephens, finance director at Mackie’s, said, “Our two litre tubs of Traditional are well established favourites in Scotland and are now becoming increasingly popular in East Asia.
“We do have a machine that makes our two litre tubs on site, but it had to alternate between moulds for making the tub and then the lid and it just couldn’t keep up.
“Previously we would buy our tubs in from Sweden, but keen to keep emissions low, we invested in our own kit in 2012.”
The announcement of the new lid machinery comes after Mackie’s invested £4 million into replacing its old freezers with low carbon, power efficient units run on ammonia.
Gerry added, “We want to be the greenest company in Britain and making sure that our machinery is efficient and right next door to our farm and ice cream factory is all part of that.
“We recycle cardboard and plastic wrapping here on the farm and always consider the life of the packaging we select for our products. Our tubs are made from a recyclable form of plastic, PP5, which is widely collected andmakes tubs that are robust enough to reuse at home.
“We keep all the materials we use under review to seek the most efficient and environmentally-friendly way of packaging our ice cream.”
