Avonmore sells record 3.5m pots of cream in run-up to Christmas

Glanbia’s Avonmore brand creamed off a tidy profit last month, selling a record 3.5 million pots of fresh cream in the run-up to Christmas.

Sales of its standard whipped cream product - the top-selling brand in the Republic - were 24 per cent up on the previous year.

The company said December saw the highest ever volume of cream dispatched in a single week and a single month.

Avonmore's fresh whipped cream was the strongest performing product in the Avonmore stable during the Christmas season, Glanbia said, while its new caramel whipped variety also posted strong sales in its first year.

"This year's success has been driven by a range of factors including new product innovations such as caramel whipped cream, improved packaging and very strong marketing campaigns," Colin Gordon, chief executive of Glanbia's consumer foods Ireland, said.

The company also reported strong sales of its Avonmore fortified milks, with an average of 10 per cent year-on-year growth recorded across the category. Sales of its Mooju flavoured milks also doubled.

At the end of 2014, Glanbia began marketing its milk brands in China for the first time in advance of the lifting of quotas.

Glanbia is using local distribution partner, Milkmore, to sell its long life (UHT - ultra-pasteurised) Avonmore milk in Shanghai and surrounding provinces.