Icelandic skyr has been a mainstay of the Icelandic diet for centuries. Now it is making waves in other Nordic countries and in the United States. MS Iceland Dairies expects to sell sixty million units of skyr this year; meanwhile 8 million are expected to be sold domestically.
Employees of MS Iceland Dairies can barely handle the international demand and exports are mainly to Finland, Norway, Switzerland, the Faroe Islands and Greenland, with the rest going to America according to Aðalstein H. Magnússon, head of sales, at MS. He also stated that “in Iceland the increase is 20% this year and was 20% last year, thus we believe there is a correlation due to the influx of tourists within the country”, says Aðalsteinn in an interview with vísir.is.
When asked if this were immense numbers, he replied: “This are stupendous numbers, since we began selling in Scandinavia four to five years, sales have increased tenfold”. Furthermore, until now farmers have managed to handle the demand for sufficient dairy produce and milk, yet new measures are being taken to increase milk production. Aðalsteinn also mentions in the interview that the taste for skyr is different in each country. For example, “we Icelanders love our vanilla and blueberry skyr, whereas Finns seem to be crazy for sky with baked apples”.
During this summer MS has had a dairy square in the center of Reykjavík and tourists have been able to taste the skyr and it has become a big hit among tourists.
Icelandic skyr has been a mainstay of the Icelandic diet for centuries. Now it is making waves in other Nordic countries and in the United States. MS Iceland Dairies expects to sell sixty million units of skyr this year; meanwhile 8 million are expected to be sold domestically.
Employees of MS Iceland Dairies can barely handle the international demand and exports are mainly to Finland, Norway, Switzerland, the Faroe Islands and Greenland, with the rest going to America according to Aðalstein H. Magnússon, head of sales, at MS. He also stated that “in Iceland the increase is 20% this year and was 20% last year, thus we believe there is a correlation due to the influx of tourists within the country”, says Aðalsteinn in an interview with vísir.is.
When asked if this were immense numbers, he replied: “This are stupendous numbers, since we began selling in Scandinavia four to five years, sales have increased tenfold”. Furthermore, until now farmers have managed to handle the demand for sufficient dairy produce and milk, yet new measures are being taken to increase milk production. Aðalsteinn also mentions in the interview that the taste for skyr is different in each country. For example, “we Icelanders love our vanilla and blueberry skyr, whereas Finns seem to be crazy for sky with baked apples”.
During this summer MS has had a dairy square in the center of Reykjavík and tourists have been able to taste the skyr and it has become a big hit among tourists.
