The company won the category with its Gentle Sheep infant milk drink, beating Wyeth Nutrition, which is owned by Nestle, Chinese infant formula giant China Feihe and Blueriver Nutrition Co.
Spring Sheep’s general manager of milk supply Thomas Macdonald says they are proud of the achievement.
“They are some pretty big names playing in the infant space globally and a sheep milking company from New Zealand managed to beat them. It also validates the consumer story,” Macdonald said.
The winners were announced during a virtual ceremony with the judging panel considering 222 entries from 25 countries across 20 categories.
Macdonald says its Gentle Sheep range had been selling well since its launch in 2019 in Malaysia. The company was constantly seeing an uptick in demand as new consumers discovered the product.
It has also partnered with actress Antonia Prebble and athlete Alison Shanks who will act as ambassadors for the company.
He says this was helping build awareness around sheep milk, which was fuelling demand.
“We’re now having to backfill that with bringing new farms onboard and we have five new farms starting in the next few weeks. They’ll start lambing and supplying milk,” he said.
This lifted Spring Sheep’s total of supplying farms to 16.
“The sheep milking category’s been growing at 65% per annum since its inception in 2015. That’s a phenomenal growth rate,” he said.
