St Paul invests heavily in new cheese factory

Cheese processing company St. Paul is investing 75 million euros in a new, ultra-modern processed cheese factory. It will be built at the current site in St. Jansteen. With a production capacity of more than 100 million kilos per year and 30 tons of cheese per hour, it will be the largest processed cheese factory in Europe and one of the most innovative and sustainable in the world, the company says. The factory will feature automated production lines, an Innovation & R&D Center, a new headquarters, a water treatment plant and a steam boiler house. The family business St. Paul is one of the larger cheese processors in Europe and has been active in the industry for decades. According to figures from 2024, annual revenue amounts to about €75 million, but it has been rising sharply in recent years. In the 'factory of the future', as St. Paul calls the new factory because of its innovative and sustainable character, the entire production process is centrally controlled and the cheese passes through different production steps over hundreds of meters to the packaged final product. Own 'smart technology' The processed cheese factory is fully designed according to our own 'Smart Cheese Solutions technology'. It took forty years of in-depth innovation and fifteen years of engineering, says CEO Dieter Kuijl. The starting point was to build a factory with high capacity, the lowest possible carbon footprint, high flexibility, a range of process possibilities combined with a very high degree of efficiency. The factory really stands out through a thoughtful combination of technology, functionality and sustainability, with each ingredient being processed separately to ensure a consistent product quality throughout the year. In this way, we remain a reliable and future-proof partner for our B2B customers in Europe. Maximum degree of automation The tight labor market forced the company to take a different look at production. That is why it has focused on maximum automation, supported by AI, carefully developed recipes and optimized processes. Kuijl: In this way, we are not only increasing our efficiency, but also responding to the challenges of the food industry around labor and food safety. Innovation St. Paul's 'Smart Cheese Solutions technology' is central to the new factory. Each raw material is treated specifically and separately to make maximum use of functionality, such as melting properties, stretch, flavor and texture, tailored to the wishes of customers in, among other sectors, foodservice, retail and industry. Planning The installation of the machines has been completed and the final test runs are in full swing. From August, the factory will be operational, followed by a phased scaling up of production in the fourth quarter of 2026. Completion of the new factory, like the new headquarters, is scheduled for mid-2027.