Darigold, a Seattle-based dairy company, said that it has resumed partial production of butter at its Caldwell facility in Idaho, which was closed since 12 October 2021 owing to a fire accident.

The incident had considerably damaged the production capability of the 91-year-old dairy production facility, which has been producing butter and powdered milk products. The building also had partial structural damage.

Before the fire accident, the Caldwell dairy production plant processed nearly 1.4 million pounds of milk per day. The plant employs over 100 people, who were fortunately not injured in the blaze.

Joe Coote — CEO of Darigold said: “When news of the fire broke, our first concern was for the safety and well-being of our employees in Caldwell, who acted with great courage and urgency to help ensure that everyone was safely evacuated from the building.

“When we knew that our employees were safe, we directed the full weight of our co-op to ensuring that milk pickups would continue in order to mitigate losses for our hard-working farmer owners, finding temporary work assignments for our displaced employees, increasing production in other Darigold facilities to mitigate disruption to our supply chain to the extent we could, and resuming production as soon it was feasible.”

According to Darigold, the resumption of partial butter production at the Caldwell dairy production plant needed the company to demolish or secure parts of the building that was most hit, while butter production sections were repaired from the fire and smoke damage.

Besides, all the butter production areas were thoroughly cleaned and sanitized, said Darigold, which is a marketing and processing subsidiary of Northwest Dairy Association (NDA).

The dairy company said that repair work continues to be done at other parts of the facility where damage due to the fire accident was more severe, while production of milk powder continues to be entirely shut down.

Caldwell Mayor Jarom Wagoner said: “Darigold has been a pillar to this community for decades and we are overjoyed they are able to continue doing what they do best, right here in this great city.

“The City of Caldwell will continue to support them as they make their way back to full operation. We hope they know this community stands behind them, supports them, and appreciates all the great things they do.”

  Caldwell, Dairy industry news, Darigold, Idaho, Jarom Wagoner, Joe Coote, Seattle, USA