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Member Spotlight: Glanbia – Innovation in the Heart of Drogheda
Welcome to the 1st Edition of Drogheda Chamber’s Member Spotlight Series. Every week Drogheda Chamber will feature one of our Members on our website and across our social media platforms.
This week we spoke to Eamonn McGuigan, Factory Manager, Glanbia Drogheda How has the business had a positive impact on Drogheda?
I believe we are a Drogheda industry. The foundations are here in this town and have been since 1957. The amount of local people that have worked here over the years is incredible. Right now between our employees, catering staff and cleaning staff we employ around 150 people.
I’m working here 26 years and over the years I’ve seen so many generations of families come through the door.
"Right now there is three generations from the one family employed here at the moment – a grandfather, father and son which is lovely. There were times in the past when we’ve had four members from the one family working here at the one time."
We pride ourselves in having very little turnover of employees. I know that many organisations struggle with employee retention but we’ve never experienced that problem.
The organisation downscaled in Drogheda in 2014 and 44 people took voluntary redundancy, but outside of that I can’t really remember anyone leaving here to go to a job someone else. I think our employees like the idea of working within their local community. We’ve had people here for 40 + years so it really does feel like a family.
Tell us one thing that people might not know about the business? We are the only site in Ireland that makes our Mooju brand of chocolate and strawberry milk which is incredibly popular. We call Drogheda the ‘home’ of Mooju milk. If you’re drinking a carton of Mooju milk you know for sure that its been made locally in Drogheda. We also produced 19 different milk blends on site and have every type of offering here. There is so much innovation going on within the organisation in terms of value added products. If you’re not getting enough Vitamin C or Vitamin D we can put it in your milk. If you’re lactose intolerant we can take the lactose out. If you’re going to the gym and need extra protein in your diet we can do that too. That is something that we as an organisation are incredibly proud of.
We call Drogheda the ‘home’ of Mooju milk. If you’re drinking a carton of Mooju milk you know for sure that its been made locally in Drogheda.
What’s next for Glanbia and the business in Drogheda? At the minute we are in the protein phase and expanding our value added products. Glanbia are seen as innovators and brand leaders in the field which I believe is one of the main reasons why the organisation is so successful.
I believe Drogheda is at the very heart of that innovation which is something I’m very proud of.
We have our research and development labs elsewhere but a lot of the testing of products is carried out here. I believe Drogheda is at the very heart of that innovation which is something I’m very proud of. As a local business employing local people I believe we are heavily involved in supporting the local community and will continue to give back what we can in the future.
We’ve supported the Fleadh and the Maritime Festival and always provide our products to local charities and schools for coffee mornings and fundraisers.
What's the best piece of business advice you’ve ever been given? 100% it has to be to never take any cuts in quality and to always protect your brand. When making decisions you always have to think about the quality of your product first. We carry out 58 tests on our products . We have about 500 local suppliers they can supply our needs and can trace any product back to the source which is incredibly important to us.