“I left Lactalis in 2019 and I earn a much better living today. » Based in Notre-Dame-de-Cenilly, near Saint-Lô (Manche), Jérôme Chapon joined, five years ago, the Laiterie de Saint-Denis-de-l'Hôtel (LSDH), an industrialist based in the Loiret. An unprecedented choice, at the time, for a dairy farmer in Manche, a department where many players in dairy processing are concentrated.
But LSDH, a specialist in UHT milk for private label brands (MDD), is one of the French dairy processors that pays its producers the best. “On average, €483 per tonne of milk, or more than €500 with primes » , confides Jérôme Chapon, one of the four partners of the SCEA of Lillay.
On 330 hectares, including 40 of pasture around the stable, the farm's 300 cows produce 3 million liters per year. Milk transformed into cartons of the consumer brand “C’qui le boss?” ! » (GMO-free and access to pasture) in Varennes-sur-Fouzon (Indre) and Cholet (Maine-et-Loire).
LSDH appears as an iconoclast by playing transparency on prices. “We’re at “Egalim 15”, us! » smiles Jérôme Chapon, in reference to the Food law, supposed to protect agricultural production costs but which will need a fourth version (Egalim 4). “LSDH partners us in tripartite contract negotiations and even calls for tenders with large retailers. Carrefour, Lidl, Auchan, Système U, Leclerc take into account agricultural raw materials (MPA) in complete transparency , underlines the 43-year-old breeder, elected in the spring, president of the APLBC, the association of milk producers for the collective good. We don't feel like we're just pawns. »
“The waiting list is as long as an arm”
The producers' organization brings together 760 farms from twenty-eight departments (as of 1is January 2024) and delivers 400 million liters to LSDH but also, since this year, 200 million liters to Novandie, a subsidiary of the Andros group, which produces yogurts and dairy desserts under the Mamie Nova brand. “These are the same prices paid to producers. »
And leitmotif ? The equitable distribution of value. “An auditor checks every month that the prices charged comply with commercial negotiations. » And guaranteed visibility for producers: “We know the price of milk for the next six months.” This “fair” model would appeal to distributors, according to the president of the APLBC. “They come to our farms once a year. » Sign of the times, “the waiting list of breeders who wish to join us is as long as an arm”.
In Manche, three other producers from the Saint-Lô region joined the APLBC in the summer of 2023 and now deliver their milk to LSDH. Around 7.5 million liters of milk in total leave the center of the Channel towards the Loiret. Thanks to the opening of new milk carton packaging lines, in the LSDH factory near Cholet (drinking milk, soft drinks), “An additional 100 million liters of milk are in the pipeline.” Enough to welcome new producers within two years. Emmanuel Vasseneix, the president of the family business, announced on October 13 that it could take over around a hundred producers abandoned by Lactalis.
