The Triballat family has been producing milk in Rians for 125 years. Selling the family brand – which has grown into an empire with 17 production sites since the 1950s – is said to be a heart-wrenching decision for Hugues Triballat, the company’s director and son of the brand’s founder. Triballat: “Today, we are the last company that is 100 per cent family-owned and 100 per cent dedicated to milk to remain in the [French] market. There’s a reason for that. All the other medium-sized companies, with turnover of €200m, €300m or €500m, have gone out of business.”

According to Triballat, the problem lies in the pressure exerted by the large retail chains: “In France, there are three or four central purchasing organisations that account for the entire French retail sector. They are behemoths that negotiate every year under enormous and constant pressure, which is often insulting and degrading. Year after year, they refuse to accept price increases. When the price of milk from farmers needs to rise, when staff wages need to rise, or the cost of packaging. We cannot keep absorbing these costs from our margins year after year. We have reached a point where it is becoming unbearable.”

The deal is awaiting the go-ahead from the competition authority. The takeover, if it goes ahead, will not take effect before 2027.