Yoplait
 |
|
| Private / joint venture | |
| Industry | Processed Dairy Goods |
| Founded | 1965 |
| Headquarters | Boulogne-Billancourt, France |
| Products | Dairy Products |
| Owner |
General Mills (51%) Sodiaal (49%) (Most individual country franchises independently owned) |
| Website | www.yoplait.com |
Yoplait /joʊ.pleɪ/ is the largest franchise brand of yogurt, jointly owned by United States–based food conglomerate General Mills and French dairy cooperative Sodiaal.
In 1964, 100,000 French farmers merged their regional dairy cooperatives to sell nationally. In 1965, two co-operatives, "Yola" and "Coplait", merged, becoming "Yoplait". The company's logo is a six-petaled flower designed by Philippe Morlighem, each petal representing one of the six main cooperatives' founders. A redesigned logo, which has been slowly rolled out since the late 2000s, uses a flower with only five petals.
On May 18, 2011, General Mills announced it had agreed to purchase a controlling 51% interest in the brand's main operating company Yoplait SAS, and a 50% interest in a related company owning the brand's intellectual property, with Sodiaal retaining the remainder. The announcement of the completion of the acquisition was made on 1 July 2011.
In Australia, Yoplait is locally manufactured by LD&D Foods Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of Lion. It uses the slogan "Yoplait; French for Yoghurt".
In Canada, General Mills markets pre-stirred Yoplait yogurt, Minigo, Tubes, Source, Creamy, Delicieux, Yop, Yoplait Basket, Yoptimal, and Asana. In 1971, the Coopérative agricole de Granby, which went on to become the largest dairy cooperative in the country—Agropur—launched the Yoplait brand in Canada. In 1993, Agropur and Agrifoods (the two largest dairy cooperatives in Canada) combined their yogurt and fresh cheese marketing and manufacturing activities to form Ultima Foods. Ultima oversaw Yoplait brand products throughout Canada until 2012, when General Mills took over the licence (Ultima continues to manufacture Yoplait products in Canada as a subcontractor, but has also launched a wholly owned rival product line, iögo).
...
Wikipedia