Sales of Mackies ice cream in the far East more than quadrupled as the family-owned firm saw profits more than double in its most recent financial year.
Managing director Mac Mackie admits the rise in overseas sales was a “surprise” although the Aberdeenshire firm is taking advantage of the uptick to extend its reach into Taiwan.
The firm has been supplying ice cream to South Korea since 2002 when it joined forces with a family company there that built up a chain of Mackie’s-branded ice cream parlours, although it is now no longer in business. The company has since been selling ice cream in South Korea with US membership warehouse retail giant Costco, which is also taking the firm’s products to Taiwan.
Mr Mackie said: “Korea has really taken off last year and hopefully carrying on this way. It has been a surprise, to be honest. Dairy products are very popular across the whole marketplace. Because Korea has done so well we are now supplying Taiwan from this year.
“There’s some awareness of the Mackie’s brand there and there is an awareness of what Scotland is about – whisky and cashmere jumpers.”
He said the retailer’s first shipment of ice cream for the Taiwan market was shipped out in January.The company is also considering “expansion plans in the pipeline for India”.
Mackie’s of Scotland, which dates back to 1912 and employs 66 staff, enjoyed a more than £500,000 rise in turnover to £11.59million in the year ended 31 May 2015. Pre-tax profits rose from £860,566 to £1.89million in the year, although this included proceeds of the sale of 180 acres of farm land that was “surplus to requirements” to a neighbouring cattle farm. Operating profit rose 10%, the company said.
Last year the company also established its chocolate bar manufacturing operation at the farm in Rothienorman after having trialed making its range of chocolate bars with a supplier in Arbroath.
The company’s range, which launched in autumn 2014 has also seen sales more than double (+120%) since introduction to the market. It has continued to show growth across its four flavours both via listings in the UK in Scottish Sainsbury’s and Tesco stores as well as via food services and export sales via the distributor Gan Teck Kar in Singapore, the company said.
“We have now bought all the equipment and moved it to the farm at Westertown. We’ve now got a lot more potential capacity. We will try to do a lot more this year with chocolate,” said Mr Mackie.
He said the company will also be using the chocolate factory to product new flavours of ice cream this year. “There’s a lot of synergy there, he added.
The firm has 280 cows, a mix of Jerseys and Holsteins. Mr Mackie said the family is looking to boost the herd’s proportion of distinctive black and white Holsteins.
“They seem to work better with our milking system and this climate – and give higher volumes of milk. We now need all the milk we can produce,” he said.