Business grant success for rural Wyre cheese business

Representatives from Wyre Council visited JJ Sandham Ltd. recently to see the incredible impact that the Rural Business Grant funding has had on the business.

As part of Wyre Council’s UK Shared Prosperity programme, rural businesses across Wyre were invited to apply for grant funding through the Rural Business Grant Programme in 2023. Businesses also benefitted through participation in businesses planning workshops as part of the process.

£140,000 had been allocated from the Government’s Rural England Prosperity Fund to help supercharge growth and create employment opportunities for the borough’s rural areas.

Wyre Council entered into a partnership agreement with Lancashire County Council for them to deliver the Rural England Prosperity Fund (REPF) business grants programme.

JJ Sandham Ltd. were one of the Wyre businesses that successfully applied for the funding where eligible applicants were able to apply for up to 40% of their total project costs and the company received £76,354 from the UK government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

JJ Sandham Ltd is a family run cheese processing and dairy smoking company based at Barton, Preston. The business is currently owned and managed by Chris Sandham who is the third generation of the family to operate from Rostock Dairy. The company was established in 1929 by Mr Sandham’s grandfather.

This grant has enabled the company to increase productivity, increase turnover and employ five new members of staff.

Before the grant was awarded, the company’s production line operations were limited by an outdated and slow vacuum packing unit. This was creating a bottleneck in the production process which was severely restricting the growth of the smoking operations. Through the grant awarded, JJ Sandham Ltd. were able to purchase brand new, modern, fully automated packing line equipment incorporating vacuum sealing and drying to replace their old, outdated equipment.

At the visit, Wyre Council representatives were able to see the brand-new machinery in action and understand just how revolutionary the grant funding has been for this company.

Michelle Gates, Managing Director at JJ Sandham Ltd. said:

“This grant has been completely transformative for us. This funding has benefited our amazing business and allowed us to be more than capable to supply all the biggest players in the industry.

“Before we applied for the grant funding, we had the capability to smoke eight tonnes of cheese a day and we invested in new equipment to be able to cut that amount of cheese a day. Then we realised we could cut and smoke this amount, but unfortunately, we did not have the correct facilities to be able to pack that amount of cheese.

“We quickly realised that we needed to find a new packing machine that would help us relieve the bottleneck in our production line. We found that only one company that were able to provide the equipment we needed which was the Reiser SuperVac System.

“The project has been more successful that we could ever have imagined; from recruiting new staff, increased turnover, profitability and expanding our customer base. So successful in fact, that we been selected by Reiser UK (who supplied the packing machine) as a case study. They are now bringing other UK businesses to our site to see the machine in operation and share our success.”

The owner Chris Sandham added:

“We were only able to pack around two tonnes of cheese a day before this new equipment revolutionised our operations, as we now we have the capability to pack eight tonnes a day. “We’re 300% up on the work, we can now go to the biggest companies in the country and service their volume, all thanks to this new equipment we were able to gain thanks to the grant funding.”

Cllr Peter Le Marinel, Portfolio Holder for Planning Policy and Economic Development at Wyre Council was part of the team that visited the company and exclaimed:

“This is exactly what the fund was designed to achieve. This grant has empowered the company to create new opportunities and deliver exceptional value to their customers and community. Seeing the increased productivity and hearing about the significant transformative effects the grant has had for this business is fantastic.”

In addition to producing a range of blended and flavoured cheese, the company started smoking a small amount of cheese in 2000. As the popularity of naturally smoked cheese increased, the company offered the smoking service to other manufacturers. The company have now established themselves as the largest dairy only contract smoking facility in the UK. The company use BRC accredited, sustainable oak smoking chips, which produce a golden colouring and smooth smoky flavour without the residual bitterness found with lower quality wood chips. Other flavours are available such as Hickory, Cherry, Beech, Spruce, Chestnut, Mesquite and Apple. As a “dairy only” service the company can ensure there is no cross contamination with other products such as fish and meat. The company have won awards for their own range of smoked cheeses and many of the contract customers have won awards for their cheese.