A farmer-owned North-West organic milk brand has folded, citing high bottling costs and distribution difficulties as the cause of its closure.
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OMG milk or the Organic Milk Group was started in 2017 by dairy farmers Gary Watson, of Lileah, and Simon Elphinstone, of Flowerdale, who wanted to take control over the marketing and sales of a small portion of their premium milk.
Mr Elphinstone pulled out of the business several months ago but Mr Watson stayed on, hoping to increase the volume of OMG milk on supermarket shelves.
He announced late in February that the brand would be bottling its last milk.
"Our biggest complaint from customers was that it was never on the shelf and to get the big supermarkets to keep it on the shelf was a bit of a battle," Mr Watson said.
"They just ordered so many cartons a week and left it at that, but greater volumes needed to be on the shelves."
Mr Watson said he changed milk processors, the bottling costs went up, and distribution was only happening once a week. In the end OMG was costing him money.
"The trouble with farming is that we are price takers and there is not much we can do about it," he said.
"I would of liked to have grown OMG, looked at doing yoghurts and creams ... to do it sucessfully I needed my own bottling and distribution, with our own trucks keeping it on the shelf every couple of days."
In his "difficult" Facebook announcement on the Organic Milk Group's Facebook Page, Mr Watson said he was sad and disappointed, and felt lke he had let his customers down.
"We know we have a great product as many of you have told us but ... we just cannot grow and take OMG to the level we would like to," he wrote.
"This decision was not made lightly."
Customers noted on the Facebook page that they were sad to see the product disappear, and offered support and congratulations to OMG on its achievements.
"You are a shining light in the Tas dairy scene and you've proven you can supply a fabulous product," one commenter wrote.
"You have literally 'poured' your heart and soul into this. Please take solace in the fact that you guys did what many only dream of," wrote another.
"Having a crack, you gotta do it very hard up against big corporates", wrote another, hinting at the difficulty of such ventures.
Mr Watson has farmed his 750 acre farm for the past 20 years and became a certified organic dairy farm in 2017.
He continues to supply Organic Dairy Farmers of Australia (ODFA) with his premium organic milk.
