D D Williamson serve up 25 years of ingredients
At the bi-annual event in Germany, D D Williamson continued to celebrate the 25th anniversary of its Little Island Industrial Estate plant.
“For the past 25 years we’ve experienced consistent product development and increased sales opportunities,” said Loretto Collins, Technical Manager, who has worked for D D Williamson (Ireland) Ltd since its inception. Employment at the Irish operation has expanded from six in 1978 to 25 today. Caramel colour produced at Little Island is used by food and beverage processors throughout Europe, Russia, Central Asia, the Middle East and Northern Africa.
Founded in the USA in 1865, D D Williamson is now the world’s largest manufacturer of caramel colour, with manufacturing locations in the USA, Puerto Rico, Ireland, China, Swaziland, and Brazil.
It was thanks to the success of Little Island, their first manufacturing facility outside of North America, that they added additional plants around the world. Their Little Island plant is part of Ireland’s 2bn per year food ingredients sector, which accounts for about 1.7bn of our food and drink exports of 7bn per year.
Over 12,000 trade visitors were expected to attend FiE, Frankfurt. John McGough, Bord Bia’s Food Ingredients Manager said, “The long-established capability to maximise the potential of first class raw materials remains the very basis of the high potential for the Irish food ingredient companies going forward. This remains the solid foundation of the industry particularly at a time of increasing innovation, research and development and new product development.”
