Arla Foods

About Arla Foods

Arla Foods is a farmer-owned dairy cooperative headquartered in Viby J, Denmark. It sources milk from dairy farmers across several European countries and serves retail, foodservice and ingredients customers with a broad dairy portfolio. The company positions itself around natural, nutritious dairy, strong food safety, and long-term value creation for its farmer owners.

Arla describes its purpose as creating the future of dairy to bring health and inspiration to the world, naturally. Its strategy emphasizes growth in branded dairy, ingredients, and selected international markets, while also improving efficiency and reducing environmental impact across farms, transport, dairies and packaging. In 2026, Arla completed its merger with DMK Group, further expanding its scale and reach under the Arla name.

Core Values

• Farmer ownership: Arla is owned by dairy farmers, and its cooperative model is built around returning value to farmer owners while supporting a competitive milk price.
• Quality and food safety: The company emphasizes careful handling, world-class food safety and high standards for milk quality from farm to finished product.
• Responsibility and sustainability: Arla highlights responsible sourcing, animal welfare, climate action, biodiversity and lower-emission operations across its value chain.
• Nutrition and health: The company frames dairy as part of healthy, balanced diets and focuses on products that provide natural nourishment and protein.
• Innovation and efficiency: Arla stresses continuous improvement through technology, operational efficiency, packaging development and new product formats.

Unique Aspects

• Farmer-owned cooperative scale: Following the 2026 merger with DMK Group, Arla became Europe’s leading farmer-owned dairy cooperative, with around 11,200 farmers, 28,800 colleagues and a combined milk pool of about 19.4 billion kg annually.
• Global ingredients leadership: Arla says it is the global leader in advanced whey proteins and the world’s largest manufacturer of organic dairy products.
• Long-running DMK partnership: Before the merger, Arla and DMK had already worked together on the ArNoCo joint venture, processing whey from DMK cheese production into whey protein concentrate and lactose for Arla’s ingredients business.
• Customer sustainability partnerships: Arla has expanded FarmAhead Customer Partnership initiatives, including a 2025 UK collaboration with McDonald’s to support biodiversity and emissions reduction on around 60 organic dairy farms.
• Major capacity investments: Recent investments include a new cheese dairy in Götene, Sweden, and upgrades to ingredient production in Denmark, reflecting a strong push into protein and cheese capacity.