Darigold Inc. has announced the departure of CEO Joe Coote from the company and the naming of board chairman Allan Huttema to interim CEO effective immediately. Coote, who had spent three years with the company and became CEO of Darigold in January 2022, plans to return to his native Australia, a company release said.
The Seattle-based dairy processor is entrenched in a multi-year transformational journey to modernize and globalize its business, focused on production capacity expansion via a brand new facility under construction in Pasco, Wash. The company also states it is modernizing its systems, reinvesting in its iconic, 100-year-old brand and refocusing its culture on excellence in execution.
Huttema has served on Darigold’s board for nine years and is one of the company’s 300 farmer-owners. He has held the role of chairman for the past three years. This move is just the latest leadership team change for the dairy producer, with the company having named Dan Hofmeister to president of its business-to-consumer division and Chris Rowe to president of its business-to-business division. Dan Bukowski also was named to senior vice president of sales recently.
Darigold is the marketing and processing subsidiary of the Northwest Dairy Association (NDA), which is owned by nearly 300 family-owned farms in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana, and handles approximately 10 billion pounds of milk annually. The company produces a full line of dairy products for retail, foodservice, commodity, and specialty markets, and is one of the largest U.S. dairy processors, operating 11 plants throughout the northwest and satellite offices in Mexico City, Mexico, and Shanghai, China. It is currently building the aforementioned 12th plant in Pasco, Wash., which is slated to open in 2024.
