The story
Royal FrieslandCampina is organized as a cooperative, with roots going back to 1871. It has grown through mergers and takeovers.
In late 1997, four Dutch dairy cooperatives merged to form Friesland Coberco Dairy Food. In June 2004, Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands granted FCDF Royal status. FCDF renamed itself Royal Friesland Foods.
Campina was created in 1989 by the merger of two regional dairy cooperatives, Melkunie Holland and DMV Campina. After this merger the company was named Campina Melkunie until it dropped the Melkunie part of the name in 2001.
In 2004, Campina and Arla Foods, a Danish dairy cooperative, announced plans for a merger, but the plan was canceled in April 2005 for undisclosed reasons although plans for other forms of cooperation are still said to be under consideration.
On 19 December 2007, Campina and Friesland Foods announced that the companies were exploring the possibility of a merger. The EU approved the merger of the two cooperatives provided that they sold off certain cheese and dairy drink divisions.
FrieslandCampina's product range consists of milk, baby and infant food, dairy drinks, yoghurts, desserts, cheese, butter, cream, milk powder and ingredients from dairy. The fruit juices and fruit drinks, organized under the company name Riedel, were sold in 2017.
After announcing that it would merge with the smaller Belgian cooperative Milcobel in December 2024, the European Commission approved the transaction in October of the following year. On January 1, 2026, the transaction became effective.
From Wikipedia’s article on FrieslandCampina, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5
