Sainsbury's Replace Doves Farm Flour With Own Brand

In the last few weeks many Sainsburys customers have been having trouble getting Doves Farm gluten free flour. Some Coeliacs took to emailing and tweeting them in attempt to find out why the flour was no longer in stock any time they went, it seems Sainsburys are swapping from stocking Doves Farm to using their own brand Free From like Asda. We can only assume this is is going to apply to all stores, we don't know for sure yet.

Doves Farm is one of the most popular and widely available gluten free flour brands on the high street with most major supermarkets stocking it, however Sainsburys seem to have dropped their contract for the flour although they are still stocking the small tubes of flours in Brown Rice Flour, Quinoa Flour and Teff.

Over Christmas Sainsburys stocked their own Free From flours and it seems that Doves Farm is now being replaced with this. Some stores haven't had this flour in since new year, others continued to stock it and some never stocked it at all, we presume when it was stocked over Christmas it was in as a trial and now it seems that it is being introduced as permanent stock.

At the moment some stores don't stock both kinds of own brand flours and only carry plain flour, they do produce both but it may depend on size of the store whether they do both, though we can't see why they won't do both versions. Those that don't have the new home brand flour yet should be getting it in soon, especially if Doves Farm has already vanished from your shelves.

Even though it is a widely popular brand there has been some controversy among Coeliacs when baking with it, some find it too heavy for their baking and it won't perform how they want it to, but generally it has a good reception on the market. Why Sainsburys have decided to opt for an own brand flour now is unclear however the price of the home brand flour will be cheaper than Doves Farm, Doves Farm is sold for £1.75 in Sainsburys and people have been purchasing the home brand in some stores for £1.50. It may only be 25p but for Coeliacs price can make all the difference when gluten free food is so expensive. It could be the home brand is also cheaper for Sainsburys to produce.

We've not been able to get hold of the flour yet so how it preforms we can't say, but looking at the ingredients they do differ to Doves Farm so are bound to perform different in some respects. Providing the ingredients are the same as from Christmas, these are the ingredients for both home brand flours.

Free From Plain Flour
Rice Flour, Potato Starch, Maize Flour.

Free From Self Raising Flour
Rice Flour, Tapioca Starch, Potato Starch, Maize Flour, Raising Agents: Calcium Phosphate, Sodium Hydrogen Carbonate; Thickener: Xanthan Gum.

We hope Doves Farms still gets stocked in other supermarkets and the others don't follow Sainsburys and Asda (who have had an own brand flour for well over a year now), we're sure Doves Farm will remain a firm favourite and it will be a sad time if it becomes obsolete like so many other gluten free manufacturers and products.