HP Hood has inked an agreement with Boston Red Sox center fielder Coco Crisp to serve as a spokesman. Hood will work with Crisp for a variety of promotional and advertising opportunities in support of the company's products and charitable programs.

Ben & Jerry's seems to have gotten the egg off its face. The Vermont-based ice cream maker, owned by Unilever, has found a certified humane egg supplier after the Humane Society complained of inhumane conditions at the company's previous vendor.

UK cheese giant Dairy Crest is selling its private label cheese making arm to First Milk, a farmer-owned Scottish dairy business which produces over two billion liters of milk a year.

Dean Foods and HP Hood have recently notified New England milk suppliers that at some facilities they will no longer accept milk from cows treated with synthetic growth hormones.

The Dairy Distribution and Fleet Management Conference will return in 2007.

Under strong pressure from dairy processors, USDA has reversed itself and decided to speed up the agency's review of proposals to amend the Class III and Class IV milk price formula manufacturing allowances for all Federal Milk Marketing Orders.

Davenport, Iowa-based Swiss Valley Farms has bought the remaining facilities of Shullsburg Creamery campus in Shullsburg, Wis. for $4 million.

Nestle USA has begun work on a $359 million production plant for flavored milk drinks and liquid Coffeemate products. The plant will be located about 40 miles northeast of Indianapolis, and is expected to total nearly 900,000 sq ft.

CARLINVILLE, Ill.-Prairie Farms Dairy, Inc. has appointed Edward Mullins as exec. v.p. and CEO. Mullins' appointment follows the July death of Roger Capps, who served as CEO of the dairy cooperative since Oct. 2000. Capps was 70, and died of cancer.

Last month a U.S. District Court in Washington D.C. dismissed a lawsuit by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM)'s that requested lactose intolerance warning labels for milk.