Davison’s Ice Cream has responded to criticism about supermarkets not putting Manx produce on offers similar to those for brands from the UK.
The company’s post has been received well by customers who said they do prefer to pay more for Davison’s quality and EVF, which offered it a big hug.
The post on Isle of Man News and Politics pointed out that many people want to support local, but the realities of cost make it difficult, they said that products, from Isle of Man Creamery and Davison “never seem to be on special offers”.
They added that “many people can’t afford the full prices of local produce but if they put them on offer every now and then people might buy local”.
Responding to the post, director Greig Davison said that comparison with some UK brands isn’t a fair one both due to the economies of scale and the quality of the ingredients used.
He said: “I can produce cheaper ice cream made using palm oil like most of the cheaper supermarket products use, instead of using locally produced cream and butter like we do.
“If I used Palm oil in my recipe I could save myself over £200,000 a year. However, by using palm oil I wouldn’t be benefiting our local farming community which is struggling at the minute and the product I make wouldn’t be anywhere near as good.”
Scale
He added: “We also only service 85,000 people here on the Island instead of the millions based in the U.K. like large ice cream producers do which means we don’t benefit from the same economies of scale as large companies do.
“Take for example Mackies ice cream in Scotland who produce upwards of 20,000 litres of ice cream a day and can afford to make 5p profit on each tubs because of their volumes being produced which allows them to keep the cost of their products to the bare minimum because of the quantities they produce being that great that they still make a healthy profit.”
Mr Davison explained that the company produces “roughly 10,000 – 20,000 litres a week during the summer months, if it’s sunny”.
Shipping
Mr Davison also touched upon the issue of shipping to the island, saying that he has to bring packaging, sugars and flavourings over which “adds massive costs straight away”.
The issue of the cost for local producers shipping materials and ingredients on and off the island has been a regular complain from businesses in recent years, but did not make any appearance in the government’s latest local economy strategy.
Mr Davison added: “All of the supermarkets here on the island at present pay for these shipping costs themselves for their stores and not the producers who supply them in the U.K., meaning the producers don’t have to factor this into their pricing, where as I have to pay these costs for my goods before I even think about making them into anything, and these costs aren’t cheap.
“Making any products on the Isle of Man small scale is expensive and if people were in business themselves they’d realise this. I’d love to offer promotions on our products but I’d be out of business by the end of the year if we did as our margins are slim enough trying to keep prices as low as we can to compete with the cheaper products coming in from across.”
5 Comments