Are summer days making you crave cool, refrigerated treats? Chobani brand yogurt is an American-made option that may do the trick!
When Kraft decided to close its 85-year-old yogurt factory in 2005, 55 people found themselves out of work as a result. But Hamdi Ulukaya stepped in quickly and decided, on a whim, to purchase the plant and start a yogurt company on his own. By 2007 Chobani rolled out its first batches of yogurt.
And now, according to the Syracuse Post-Standard:
Today, South Edmeston is the epicenter of the skyrocketing supermarket category of Greek yogurt. Since late 2007, the former Kraft plant about 60 miles southeast of Syracuse has been home to Chobani, the best-selling Greek yogurt in the United States.
The plant now has 600 employees (and growing). It sold about $500 million worth of yogurt in the past year, a 206 percent year-over-year increase. It consumes more than 2.8 million pounds of milk (enough to fill roughly 50 tanker trucks) each day. That’s helped spur a mini-resurgence in New York’s dairy industry.
Four years ago, Chobani didn’t exist. Now it’s the national market leader in a booming grocery category.
According to Chobani’s website, its products are made only from natural ingredients and “with milk from cows not treated with rBST.”
To learn more about Chobani’s products, find stores that carry them or download coupons, click here.
Photo from Chobani’s website.