Nick praises Charlie’s Farm Shop for new milk bottle initiative
Arundel & South Downs MP Nick Herbert visited Charlie’s Farm Shop in Bury on Thursday (24 October) to see a new self-service milk bottling station which is helping shoppers reduce their plastic waste.
The MP praised Charlie Hughes’ introduction of the new milk machine which has already proved to be popular with customers. The farm now supplies its own milk through a milk dispenser in the shop and sells glass bottles which can be returned and refilled.
The farm shop is supporting those customers who are looking to reduce their reliance on single-use plastics by providing another way to purchase farm-fresh dairy milk. The milk sells for 90p per litre, the same as pre-bottled milk, and the glass bottles cost £2.00.
Charlie’s Farm Shop is understood to be the only farm shop in West Sussex selling milk in this way, but it is hoped it will grow in popularity.
Charlie Hughes is a third-generation dairy farmer at Southview Dairy Farm. Since taking over the running of the farm, Charlie has embraced new dairy farming technologies which has helped to increase yields, producing over a million litres a year. The farm processes and bottles its own milk and uses robotic milking machines. Added to this, the farm generates its own power via solar.
Charlie Hughes said: “As a farming business we care about the welfare of our customers, our animals and our land, and for a long time we have been wanting to introduce an option for customers to have reusable bottles for our milk, to help with the drive to lower plastic bottle use in West Sussex and the UK.
“We’ve introduced two self-service machines offering pasteurised semi-skimmed and whole milk to our customers to fill into glass bottles.
“We’ve sold over 300 glass, reusable bottles since launching and should be able to lower plastic use by 40 per cent at least over the next year if customers keep this up, which is brilliant news.”
Mr Herbert said: “Charlie has earned the well-deserved award of Sussex Farmer of the Year and his farm shop has picked up accolades in local food and drink awards. I am absolutely delighted to see that he is once again leading the way by embracing a consumer-led reduction in single-use plastics with the new self-service milk bottling station.”
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Photograph – Nick Herbert and Charlie Hughes at the milk-bottle refilling station in Charlie’s Farm Shop.