Morrisons has acquired fresh meat facility in North Wales as it continues on a spree of supply chain acquisitions.

The retailer has taken full ownership of Farmers Boy Deeside, which it had a majority stake in, after buying the remaining 49% of shares from food producer Cranswick.  

Morrisons and Cranswick jointly acquired the site in 2010 and have invested £30m in it. The Bradford-based grocer will now use the facility to revamp of its cooked meat range this summer.

The 175,000 square foot factory, which has been significantly developed and now employs 600 people, currently produces more than 1.5 million packs of sliced ham and poultry products each week.  

Morrisons group manufacturing director Martyn Fletcher said: “We have worked closely with Cranswick over the past 18 months to grow this site in Deeside and would like to thank them for their fantastic support in developing a state of the art facility.”

Morrisons chief executive Dalton Philips is taking steps to vertically integrate the grocer’s supply chain. The retailer has acquired floristry wholesaler Flower World, a seafood packing factory in Grimsby and a meat processing facility in Cheshire in the last year.