Glebe Farm Foods, the British producer of award-wining oat drink PureOaty, is making a multi-million pound investment into its second-generation Cambridgeshire farm, to bring its entire production process on one site for the first time. Packaging for PureOaty is set to take place on farm grounds, where the oats are also grown and milled.
Thanks to a new Tetra Pak filling line, part of the brand new facility on the farm, PureOaty will be the only British oat drink which is fully produced on a single site in the UK. This will further reduce the product’s food miles– with now just 300 metres between oat milling and where the oat drinks are packaged.
The independently run business, led by siblings Rebecca and Philip Rayner, expects the cutting-edge packaging plant to open in August this year. With the capacity to pack 10,000 litres per hour, it will produce fully sterile packs for 12-month ambient storage in both 1L and 500ml Tetra Pak’s.
The plant will introduce tethered caps across all the brand’s packs. These innovative caps stay attached to the carton to make recycling easier and reduce litter – further amplifying Glebe Farm’s commitment to sustainability.
The facility will create the opportunity for the business to co-pack for other manufacturers or retailers for the first time, generating an increase in capability in the UK plant-based co-packing sector.
Philip Rayner, Co-owner and Managing Director of Glebe Farm, said: “Our new plant is an investment in meeting a growing demand for oat drinks as part of a plant-based diet. We know that more and more people in the UK want to know where their food and drink comes from and how it’s made. At Glebe Farm, we’re proud that our oats are 100% sown, grown and milled in the UK. We’re even prouder to now be able to say that oat drinks will leave our Cambridgeshire farm ready to be enjoyed, without being processed anywhere else.
“Not only will our new facility enable us to produce in greater quantity, but it’ll help us do so in an even more sustainable way. We won’t need to take our oat drinks elsewhere to be packaged, which will mean they’ll have the lowest food miles of any oat drink brand in the UK. The initiation to use the new tethered caps, set to be the standard across all our oat drinks, will boost the recyclability of our packaging.
“This upgrade is a big step for us as an independent UK producer, and we’re all really excited about where it will take us next.”
Awantika Chadha, Sustainability Manager at Tetra Pak, said: “Decarbonising food systems is a key priority for Tetra Pak and Glebe Farm, and taking steps to move packaging onsite will help minimise the food miles travelled in production. Our technologies and packaging innovations will help Glebe Farm to improve efficiencies and reduce the business’ impact on the environment.”
The Purest British Oats
Many of the oat-based products on supermarket shelves today are milled and manufactured at facilities that also process grains like wheat, barley or rye. This can lead to contamination of the oats meaning they lose their purity and become unsuitable for the 1 in 100 of people who are coeliac.[i]
100% sown, grown, milled and packed in the UK, the farmers at Glebe Farm know where every single oat that goes into their products comes from. That means every oat is guaranteed to be of the best quality and 100% gluten-free. Even better, being British grown and produced means they have the lowest food miles on the market, making them the top choice for sustainable oat products.
