At Moss Vale, the Dairy Farmers’ Co-operative Milk Co opened a milk depot and butter factory in 1922, with its suppliers spread as far as Robertson and Bundanoon. At Bowral, from 1921 farmers’ milk was delivered to a new depot opened by the Fresh Food & Ice Co (FF&I) on Station Street, and cream from 1926 to a butter factory next door, run by the Berrima Co-operative Rural Society. 

The Berrima Co-op’s annual butter output reached almost 300 tonnes by 1935 and it opened a rural produce department in 1936. In 1953 the Co-op acquired FF&I’s milk depot from Peters Milk, that company having bought it in the 1940s. This was a major milestone for the Co-op, fulfilling the long-held ambition of local farmers to own the depot that received and treated their milk. 

In 1964 the Co-op introduced bulk pick-up of milk from refrigerated vats on the farms. Its greatest annual intake of milk was 18.54 million litres, received in 1967. It ceased butter manufacture in 1971, all milk being required for Sydney’s increased demand. 

In 1972 the Berrima Co-op created a wholly owned subsidiary, the Bowral Co-op (Trading) Society, to run its rural produce department. The premises were extended into the butter factory site, providing a wide range of commodities and household items and attracting a district-wide clientele. Despite serious fire damage in 1980, trading continued there until 1993 when the Bowral Co-op moved to its present location on Kirkham Road. 

Road tankers took all local farmers’ milk directly to Sydney from 1992 and the Berrima Co-op’s milk depot closed. It is now Bowral’s iconic Milk Factory Gallery. 

At Moss Vale, the dairy trade prospered under Dairy Farmers, which became a major player throughout NSW. In 1955 the local branch acquired the Robertson Co-operative Dairy Society Ltd, owner of a cheese factory and several stores. This Co-op had begun cheese making in February 1936 at a factory it built on the village’s eastern end. During the first year its milk suppliers increased from 26 to 70 and it turned out 363,552 pounds of cheese, earning a good profit and winning every first prize at the NSW Dairy Produce Exhibition held in July 1936. 

Dairy Farmers’ continued the output of this quality Robertson cheese, but ceased butter making at Moss Vale to concentrate on the milk trade. In 1956 it installed a pasteuriser and bottling unit and in 1962 purchased the Bowral and Burradoo Milk Supply Zone, establishing a depot in Bowral. Having had up to 180 dairy farmer suppliers in the 1950s boom period, this dropped to 65 in the 1970s due to farm mergers and closures. In 1977 the Moss Vale depot was taking in about 300,000 litres of milk a week, of which about 65,000 litres was packaged and sold locally, a portion sent to the Robertson factory, and the remainder railed to Sydney.

Dairy Farmers introduced bulk pick-up of farmers’ milk in 1966. In 1973 it distributed the district’s first milk in cartons, rather than bottles, having installed a cartoning machine and homogeniser. It ceased cheese making in 1989 at Robertson, where the former cheese factory remains a major village landmark, and closed the Moss Vale depot after road tankers took the milk from 1992. Harvey Norman now occupies the depot site.

By the 1990s, Dairy Farmers was supplying 40 percent of Australia’s fresh milk and exporting dairy products to 26 countries. 

Some of the above is drawn from a wealth of dairy industry information left by the late Joe Ford, who served on the Berrima Rural Co-op Board. A much earlier supporter was Joseph Loseby, a dairy farmer at Lower Mittagong. In 1883, to celebrate the start of the trade, a Milkmen’s Ball and Supper was held in his barn, being attended by 150 local farmers and friends. Thomas Mort was praised for the impetus he gave the district: “In 1876 he took it into his head to ask for a milk supply from the farmers here and they now send over 1200 gallons.”

The district’s dairying industry, while much changed since then, still thrives.