Follow that Calf: Introducing Bidlea Dairy

Welcome to our latest blog segment which will follow Holmes Chapel based, Bidlea Dairy Farm. We will be giving you monthly updates of what life is like working at Bidlea Dairy Farm, as well as following Bidlea’s newborn calf to the Cheshire Show. 

But first, let’s introduce Bidlea Dairy farm…

Bidlea Dairy was founded by Clifford and Madeline Brown, who bought the farm in the 1960’s as a fruit farm. The name Bidlea originated from ‘Bid’ which was taken from the Brown Family’s previous farm in Biddulph, and ‘lea’ meaning lea side of the Valley.

Bidlea’s free-range pedigree herd is over 100 years old, which means Bidlea have won many competitions locally and nationally over the years. Some of the oldest families are still in the herd today such as Bidlea Tagaslin, Bidlea Peach, Bidlea Marigold, Bidlea Papoose.

The members of the family run dairy farm include Ray, Jill, Adam and wife Becky, Ryan and his wife Becky and Melanie.

We have a great team of workers who are all dedicated and focused on the farm and the herd as much as we are.

Ryan and Becky are passionate about the herd and do a fantastic job upholding high standards of breeding the cows for quality and longevity. They also love entering cattle for shows and competitions.

Adam and Becky, who are running the new dairy adjacent to the farm, have both had experience on farms before and Becky has been heavily involved with marketing and sales.

Ray, Jill and Mel also have daily responsibilities of the running of the farm.

The reason we do what we do is because we feel dairy products, like milk, are well under valued and not promoted enough. We would like to educate the public and show the importance of milk by having open days around the dairy and farm walks.

There are huge health benefit of all dairy products and we aim to highlight the importance of them by being in control of the marketing, processing and delivering of the quality produce.

It’s local, fresh, traceable, high quality, sustainable.