New Cork dairy brings back glass bottle milk with modern twist - and it's going viral

Irish Independent

17-05-2025

Lapland Dairy, situated on the back road between Carrs Hill and Maryborough on the southside of the city, has only been open for three weeks, but their farm-fresh, non-homogenised milk – which is produced and pasteurised on site – has already exploded in popularity across social media.
The shop allows customers to buy a glass bottle and fill it up with either plain or flavoured milk, all through automated contactless payments. The couple behind the venture are still distributing much of the milk from their 140-strong herd to co-ops to be used in larger distribution. And they candidly acknowledged that the new project was a gamble.
'We saw it on Ear to the Ground. I was working in quality at the time, and I thought it could work for us with our location,' said Heather Smith, who runs the self-service dairy shop alongside her husband, Melvyn.
'We did a road survey when we were going for planning and found that there's 7,000 cars passing between 7 am and 7 pm, so there was serious passing trade', said Melvyn, whose family have owned the Lapland farm for generations.
'It took a bit of convincing because I had to do the building from scratch, so it was hard going for a while.'
However, the hard work has paid off. The farm has a constant flow of people, some newcomers, and some who return with their branded glass bottles from a previous visit, ready to fill up. Heather says the instant popularity has been a huge surprise to the couple.
'Social media has been massive for us, not just our social media but everyone sharing pictures and videos on Instagram, and TikTok is huge,' said Heather, who revealed that former Irish Olympian and 'Ireland's Fittest Family' coach Derval O'Rourke was a recent customer while the name is also doing the rounds amongst the country's best rugby players.
'Most people drink milk, and the novelty of the flavours seems to draw a crowd. We buy a liquid flavour and add it while the milk is being added so it's well mixed.
'The most popular flavours are strawberry and chocolate, but we also have whiskey and cream, Oreo, which is very popular, and salted caramel.
'We have a very popular flavour coming, which is Dubai Chocolate!'
'It's going back to the old times when you used be getting milk in a glass bottle, and it's the flavour as well, you can't beat the flavour of whole milk. You're getting a better product,' said Melvyn, who revealed the 'Lapland' name owes itself to the local townland, and has nothing to do with a certain man in a red suit.
'They say you can't beat the flavour out of the glass bottle!'
While the couple says they will bide their time before deciding whether to move to the direct-to-consumer model full time, there are plans to further diversify the business. Melvyn outlined the plans as the queue for the two self-service machines went out the door of the shop that he built himself over the past few years.
'We'll be selling free-range eggs through an honesty box and potatoes as well,' he says, with the blazing sunshine drawing in customers of all ages. 'We're also getting in a coffee machine as well, but things are just crazy at the minute.'
'It's extremely busy,' Heather adds. 'We're open 9 am to 9 pm, and then there's pasteurisation and cleaning to be done outside those hours.
'I don't think we've really thought about what's next.
'You have to be realistic. The numbers that we have aren't going to last forever, so once the numbers start to settle down, then we can start thinking about what we're going to do next.'