Toppings for McDonald’s ice-creams arriving from Knjazevac – Desing to expand production to 10,000 m2 and open new Taste Center

(Production process at Knjazevac facility) Toppings for ice-creams and shakes at McDonald’s restaurants in Serbia, featuring strawberry, pomegranate, caramel, chocolate and vanilla flavors, are produced by the local company Desing from Knjazevac. Around 250 tons of products made in the factory are delivered to the restaurant chain annually.

The cooperation between the two companies began in 2000 and McDonald’s milkshakes and ice-creams have used around 5,000 tons on toppings and syrups so far. Deliveries are made twice a month, due to short shelf-lives of the products and McDonald’s standards.

– All our products are adjusted to customers’ demands and we make what they ask for and want for their products. When it comes to McDonald’s restaurants, we adhere to all their quality and food safety standards, and we also own the pertinent certificates – says Dejan Milijanovic, Sales Manager at Desing.

Thanks to the good cooperation and McDonald’s Serbia’s recommendations, they’ve established cooperation with the company in the region as well. They supply all restaurants in Bulgaria and Slovenia with seasonal products, and there’s a possibility of the cooperation spreading to markets of Western Europe.

Spreading to foreign markets is one of the company’s priorities. The toppings made in the factory are for now being exported to 14 countries, namely, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, Slovenia, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece, Great Britain, Malta, Germany, Italy and Russia. The company plans to export 25% of its total production in 2017.

Desing is a family business producing and developing fruit preparations which are further used as raw materials in the ice-cream industry, confectionery industry, baking and pastry industry, non-alcoholic drinks industry and the HoReCa sector. This company’s operations are directed at producers in these industries locally and abroad, not to end consumers.

New production capacities

In order to expand the current production capacities, which take up 2,000 m2, Desing bought the cheese factory Jersey in 2015. The factory has been fully reconstructed and adapted to the needs of the production of toppings and syrups, and a considerable part of production lines should be moved to the new 6,000 m2, fully adapted, by the end of the year. The remaining 4,000 square meters should be equipped in 2018, when the entire production process should be moved to the new 10,000 square meters.

(Desing owns plantations of Oblacina sour cherries) – Fifteen new workers will also be employed in the new facility. In the first phase, the production will be conducted in both the old and the new facility, whereas the old one is later to be turned into a “taste center” – Milijanovic explains.

The Desing factory currently employs 35 workers in the office in Belgrade and the production facility in Knjazevac. As they say in the company, they are also hiring 20 seasonal workers in the period from February till August.

The current annual production amounts to 1,500 tons of finished products, whereas, the moving to the new production facility is expected to raise the capacities to 5,000 tons a year by 2020.

Local raw materials

Desing gets its ingredients from cooling facilities, and all the fruit used to make syrups and toppings comes from local fields. Furthermore, they own their own 14-ha plantation of Oblacina sour cherries, and they also plan to grow other fruit as well, depending on the market demands, the company says. When it comes to aromas, there are no local suppliers, and they are mostly acquired from Germany, which also provides a part of the packaging.

Aside from the Belgrade office and the Knjazevac factory, Desing founded the Desing Taste Center in 2016, a center for development, education and innovations at the Science and Technological Park in Belgrade.

As the company’s director and owner, Miodrag Tomic, explains, they’ve established successful cooperation with the Faculty of Agriculture in Belgrade as well, and their best students are sent to the company for professional development.

Desing was founded in 1992. The World Bank pronounced it the second best company in Serbia in 2007, and it received the Aurea Investment of the Year Award from the business portal eKapija in 2014.

Katarina Stevanovic

Desing doo Beograd

Naučno-tehnološki park Beograd

Poljoprivredni fakultet Beograd

Desing

Desing Knjazevac

Desing Taste Center

McDonalds

Jersey

cheese factory Jersey

Jersey Knjazevac

ice cream toppings

McDonalds Bulgaria

McDonalds Slovenia

Dejan Milijanovic

Miodrag Tomic