Hownow (brilliant) brown cows!

For certain smallholdings, Covid-19 has brought welcome growth. The carbon-neutral Hownow Dairy in South Devon is one such firm that has experienced an exponential hike in home deliveries. Catherine Austen reports

- Catherine Austen

Every cloud has a silver lining. Although it would be crass to apply this most trite of clichés to the Covid-19 pandemic, there are flashes of brightness that have broken through the gloom.

Oliver Lee’s Hownow Dairy, a two-year-old ‘cow-to-cup’ organic milk delivery business in South Devon, has exploded in size since the crisis began.

“We doubled the business in a fortnight, and it’s still growing,” says Oliver, 27. “At the beginning of March we were a growing little business, working hard on gradually increasing awareness and adding 10 new customers a week. Covid-19 came along and, because we went into lockdown, people wanted home deliveries and we had the network.

“The first week we did 25 new deliveries on top of the 275 we already had. The week after we added 200. Now we’re at 700.”

Oliver admits that he had “a brief panic”.

“But I had a five-minute breather, and got on with it — more cows, more grazing, more delivery drivers.”

Oliver rents his cows — pedigree Ayrshires — from the man he calls his mentor, Russell Ashford, for whom he worked for four years.

“I rang him and said I needed 10 more cows tomorrow,” laughs Oliver, who has 40 acres at Ladywell Farm in South Hams, enough for 40 cows, and he quickly rented another 56 acres from a neighbour.