Hutchinson Flour Mill

It is now some one hundred and eighty five years since Robert Hutchison first milled flour adjacent to Kirkcaldy Harbour; and flour of the highest quality is stilled milled at the same locus in what is now a ‘state of the art’ facility operated by Carr’s Flour: Hutchisons Mill. Tim Hall, Operations Director, outlined ‘Project Catbells 2012/13’ to members at the weekly meeting. (Catbells is a Cumbrian hill near to Derwent Water). Carr’s Flour already has mills at Silloth and Maldon. With its third mill now operating at Kirkcaldy, Carr’s Flour currently processes 300,000 tonnes of wheat annually at its mills. Many will already know seventy to eighty percent of wheat shipped in to Kirkcaldy now comes by sea to Kirkcaldy harbour; with consequent, significant, and welcome reduction in wheat deliveries to the new mill by road. Project Catbells was the successful building of the new mill begun with planning permission given by Fife Council in February 2012; and resulting in the first supply of highest quality flour to customers by September 2013. Describing provision of the port facility as ‘critical’, Tim Hall indicated the mill processes 3000 tonnes of wheat weekly. 600 tonnes of high spec, high quality flour goes weekly to Warburtons bakery at Bellshill. Regular road deliveries of flour also go to places like Aberlour (home of Walker’s Shortbread), Berwick, Orkney, Shetland. High public demand to tour Carr’s Flour: Hutchisons Mill at a recent ‘Doors Open Day’ in Kirkcaldy evidences high interest and no little satisfaction that this Kirkcaldy mill will long benefit the economy of the ‘lang toun’  and beyond. Past President Brian Munro thanked Tim Hall for his positive description of a 21st Century manufacturing success story on our doorstep.