The Tofoo Co is building a manufacturing facility at Malton Enterprise Park in North Yorkshire intended to double its production capacity and provide three and a half times as much production space as its existing operation. Construction began in September 2026, and the company expects the new factory to be completed in autumn 2027, when it plans to move from its current premises.
The facility has been designed to support annual sales in excess of £70 million. That figure represents the scale of business the proposed operation could accommodate, not revenue already generated or a confirmed order book. The project also supports the company's longer-term ambition of producing more than 10,000 tonnes of tofu annually by 2033.
Harrison Developments Malton LLP is responsible for developing and constructing the site. HSBC is supporting the investment alongside the company's shareholders and private equity investor Comitis Capital. The overall capital cost and the value of individual machinery contracts have not been disclosed, leaving the financial scale of the project distinct from its planned sales capacity.
The expansion responds partly to physical constraints at the existing factory, where the available buildings have become increasingly crowded. Leases on those premises are due to expire in 2028, giving the business a defined timeframe for relocation. Moving production before those arrangements end will require the new facility to be completed and commissioned with enough time to establish dependable operation.
An increase in floorspace of three and a half times alongside a doubling of production capacity suggests that additional space is being reserved for wider operating requirements. The company has not published a factory plan assigning that space to processing, warehousing or other functions, so the specific layout cannot yet be described. Production capacity will ultimately depend on installed equipment, staffing, utilities and the way process stages connect.
Tofu manufacture depends on controlled preparation of soya beans and conversion of their proteins into a cohesive product. The company's established method uses water, organic, GM-free soya beans and nigari, a coagulant extracted from seawater. Its own product information describes a traditional recipe intended to produce firm tofu without requiring customers to press out excess water at home.
In conventional tofu production, soaked beans are processed with water to obtain soya milk, which is heated before a coagulant is added. The proteins aggregate into curds that can then be formed and pressed. Temperature, concentration, coagulation conditions and moisture removal influence the texture and consistency of the product. The company has not specified the process equipment selected for its new building or whether it intends to change this established method.
Higher throughput requires control across successive operations rather than additional capacity at one machine alone. Ingredient preparation, heating, coagulation, pressing, cooling, packaging and storage need to accommodate the planned volumes. A bottleneck in any stage can restrict the rate at which finished products leave the factory, even if individual machines have spare capacity.
Tofoo also produces tempeh and seitan products alongside its tofu range. Different product families can place different demands on ingredients and processing, but the October development does not allocate future production capacity between them. The 10,000-tonne aspiration relates specifically to tofu, rather than an identified combined output figure for every product sold by the company.
Water and energy use have been considered during site planning. The company identifies opportunities for wastewater reduction, heat recovery, solar generation and additional electric vehicle charging, while space will be reserved for a full effluent treatment facility. These are proposed or enabled features of the development; quantified savings, system specifications and confirmed commissioning dates have not been published.
Food manufacturing effluent can contain suspended material and organic residues from ingredients and cleaning processes. Treatment equipment must be selected according to the volume and composition of the wastewater, as well as the discharge requirements applying to the site. Reserving space now offers scope to integrate treatment with the factory's drainage and utility infrastructure, although it does not establish which treatment technology will be installed.
Heat recovery depends similarly on the temperatures and timing of process streams. Recovering useful heat from a suitable source can reduce demand elsewhere, but food processing requires attention to hygiene, separation of fluids and the operating limits of equipment. Without a design or baseline consumption data, a percentage reduction in energy use cannot be attributed to the new factory.
The company's managing director and chief executive, David Knibbs, has identified growth in the UK and Europe as the commercial reason for the investment. Tofoo has developed from a small Malton tofu business acquired by Knibbs and Lydia Smith in 2015, launching its branded range the following year. Its established ingredient sourcing and processing approach will need to be maintained as manufacturing volumes increase.
By autumn 2027 the business expects to have a substantially larger production site available, but completion of the building will be only one stage of the expansion. The measurable industrial outcome will follow commissioning, when installed manufacturing capacity, product quality, wastewater systems and actual throughput can be assessed against the plans announced in October.
