21 April, 2009 - This month, Fonterra's The Pastryhouse business will begin supplying premium pastries to McDonald's McCafés across Australia and New Zealand.
This builds upon a 25 year partnership between Fonterra and McDonald’s, which has seen both businesses innovating alongside each other to create dairy-based products for McDonalds in 30 markets worldwide.
René Dedoncker, Global Director Fonterra Foodservices, said supplying pastries to McCafés across Australia and New Zealand further embeds the strong working relationship between Fonterra and McDonald’s.
“We currently supply McDonald’s with slice-on-slice cheese in 25 markets in the Asia Pacific Middle East and Africa region, as well as milk, yoghurt, parmesan, cheddar, butter and shake and sundae mix to its Australian business.
“Fonterra will in conjunction with McDonald’s supply chain partners, Fresh Start Bakeries (Australia) and North’s Bun Company Ltd (New Zealand), supply 470 McCafés in Australia and 50 McCafés in New Zealand with great tasting sweet and savoury pastries, and to meet these increased volumes, we have increased The Pastryhouse’s production capabilities and moved to a 24 hour production cycle.
“Over the past few months, we’ve been gearing up to cope with the increased demand, including hiring an additional 30 people at our manufacturing site,” he said.
The PastryHouse, in Wiri, New Zealand, was established in 1983 and today under the direction of Philippe Bourgeais, Bakery Technical Manager and Pastry Chef, produces around 30 pastry varieties using a mix of traditional and innovative pastry making techniques.
“The Pastryhouse pastries are delicate handmade artisan croissants and pastries made the traditional way,” said René.
“The lamination process is completed by hand using only the highest quality ingredients including pure 100 per cent New Zealand butter to give a superior natural flavour to our dough.
“This project has been almost three years in the making and involved a significant amount of consultation to ensure we created a great tasting product, suited to McDonald’s business and most importantly its customers.
“McDonald’s, like Fonterra, is a consumer-led business, with the customer at the heart of its business. As such, their consumer research helped determine what pastries appealed to McCafé customers at different times of the day, and these insights helped drive and shape our innovation process.
“Fonterra’s chefs and food technologists worked closely with McDonald’s to fine tune the pastries to meet McDonald’s desired flavour profile and formats, such as adding a little more cinnamon or caramel to the recipe,” said René.
Mr Dedoncker adds that over a period of 25 years, Fonterra has established itself as a preferred supplier to McDonald’s thanks to its global dairy expertise, consistency in quality and investment in dairy innovation.
In late 2008, Fonterra became a McDonald’s global Target Capable Supplier for slice-on-slice cheese – used in McDonald’s burgers – in the Asia-Pacific/Middle East-Africa (APMEA) region.
Fonterra joined only two other McDonald’s suppliers in Australasia to have ever achieved this status.
Attaining this status means Fonterra’s slice-on-slice cheese, produced at our Eltham site in New Zealand, is now the benchmark standard of quality for anyone supplying slice-on-slice cheese to McDonald’s within the APMEA region.
“Fonterra has a lot to offer McDonald’s as our quality controls ensure we provide consistent, high quality products across the world, and our dairy knowledge ensures we’re at the leading edge of dairy innovation,” said René.
“We take great pride in being a valued trusted partner of McDonald’s. Over the years we have developed an in-depth understanding of their business, their systems, processes, and commitment to corporate social responsibility and compliance requirements. This in turn enables us to work proactively with them to continue to innovate and grow their menu,” said René.