Meet the Team

John Reynolds leads the experienced team at Volac Milk Replacers Limited, drawing on more than 35 years of international marketing and management experience in the animal health and livestock nutrition industries.

John studied Agricultural Science at Nottingham University’s Sutton Bonington campus, which now encompasses world-leading laboratories and specialist facilities for studying biosciences and veterinary medicine. Following his degree, he joined the Ciba-Geigy animal health set-up and managed a sales territory in Devon before moving into product management.

Following the merger of Ciba-Geigy and Sandoz to form Novartis in 1996, John moved to the Switzerland head office to take up a global product management post. This led to promotion to global marketing manager, then another elevation to business unit manager for vaccines, and eventually a move to the Southern Hemisphere to manage the Novartis animal health business in Australia and New Zealand.

John returned to the UK in 2011 and joined Volac International to head up its animal nutrition operation including the launch and management of the Feed For Growth initiative. He’s now managing director of the Volac Milk Replacers Limited business acquired by Denkavit at the end of 2023.

A family man with four children, John lives in Suffolk and loves the countryside. Outside of work he is a school governor and parish councillor and also enjoys cycling and undertaking a variety of volunteer roles in his local community.

Drawing on an extensive academic background, plus more than a decade of young ruminant feed industry commercial experience, Dr Jessica Cooke has championed high quality milk replacer development under the Volac brand for more than 15 years.

Jessica grew up on a mixed farm in Sussex before heading north after school to the University of Leeds to study zoology, graduating with a first-class BSc Hons degree. She then moved onto the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) in London, where she completed a PhD studying the impact of calf development on the subsequent fertility, productivity, and longevity of dairy cows. This was followed by a three-year period of postdoctoral research into dairy cow fertility, also at the RVC.

Since joining Volac International in 2010 as their young animal technical specialist, Jessica has continued to forge research links with leading Universities, agricultural colleges and other important industry stakeholders – most recently leading a keynote PhD study at the University of Liverpool into the impact of calf development and growth on lifetime dairy cow performance. Throughout her career, she has published more that 30 research papers on calf and heifer rearing.

Her combined academic and commercial experience background has allowed her to provide in-depth technical support for the youngstock rearing portfolio at Volac Milk Replacers Limited. The results of Jessica’s career-long youngstock studies are still feeding into the current ‘Feed for Growth’ product development programme.

In her current role as R&D Manager, she is responsible for leading and managing the pipeline of young animal innovation projects driving product development, project management of all R&D trial activity in GB and Ireland, and delivering best practice advice to farmers, trade customers, vets and other key industry stakeholders.

In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her young family, running and walking – most recently completing a ‘Macmillan Mighty Hike’ to help raise funds for cancer research.

In more than 20 years with Volac, Ian Watson has fulfilled a variety of sales, marketing and technical roles, making him well qualified to head up the commercial team at Volac Milk Replacers Limited, whilst still retaining overall technical responsibility for milk replacer formulation and performance.

Ian grew up on a mixed dairy and sheep unit in south-west Scotland, readily admitting that his childhood was dominated by rugby, school, working on the family farm and not much else.

On turning 18 he left home to study Agriculture at Harper Adams University (HAU) – initially for an HND and then his degree. His four years at college became a springboard to casual farm work in Oxfordshire and then further afield as part of ‘a gap year’ international travel experience. He worked on an arable farm in Western Australia, a cotton plantation in Queensland, visited New Zealand and returned to the UK via Canada.

Following a brief period with Promar International, Ian joined Volac International in 2004, starting as a graduate trainee. Since then, he has immersed himself in all aspects of the business; initially in customer care and marketing, and then area sales management, before becoming regional manager for the southern sales team.

Having always been interested in the animal science side of agriculture, Ian jumped at the chance to study for a two-year ruminant nutrition diploma on day release back at HAU – an experience he thoroughly enjoyed. This set him up for a move into the Volac technical department in 2013 and he has never looked back.

He now combines accountability for Volac Milk Replacers Limited commercial operations and GB team of business managers with overall responsibility for product formulation, recipe optimisation, labelling and new product development (in conjunction with Dr Jessica Cooke).

Married with two children and based in Oxfordshire, Ian is a keen cyclist and passionate Scottish rugby fan. He can often be found on the touchline supporting and encouraging his young son to develop his own burgeoning rugby career.

Una Hickey has worked in the milk-based food industry and driven development of the Triple AAA Golden Maverick calf milk replacer brand for most of her 30-year career.

After studying Applied Biology and Analytical Science at what is now the Munster Technological University in Kerry, Una joined the baby and infant milk formula manufacturer Cow and Gate, working in the company laboratories. Three years later she moved into the animal feed industry, taking a laboratory post with Connolly’s Red Mills where she was involved in quality control testing of raw materials and finished feed.

In the late 1990s, Una joined Golden Vale, which was then acquired by the Kerry Group in 2001, bringing Una her first involvement with the Triple AAA Golden Maverick brand. This move enabled her to broaden her commercial experience and develop her calf rearing knowledge – and she was soon selling the brand all over the world.

Volac purchased the Kerry Group calf milk replacer business in 2008 and then became her new employer, allowing Una to develop further agricultural product sales experience. She was also able to develop her technical nutrition skills during this period, studying for a Level 7 degree in ruminant nutrition and then a diploma in ruminant nutrition from Harper Adams University.

Since 2017 Una has managed the sales team for the whole of Ireland and is fiercely proud of the fact that Triple AA Golden Maverick remains the number one calf milk replacer in the country.

Away from work Una enjoys following GAA and playing football for her local ‘Mothers and Others’ team. She’s also secretary of her local gun club.

Samantha Sampson graduated from Harper Adams University with a degree in Animal Science (Health & Welfare) and has maintained a keen interest in the subject whilst fulfilling commercial marketing and product management roles in the pet and ruminant livestock industries.

Sam is an accomplished marketer, having completed her Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) qualifications while working in the pet sector. Since joining Volac as the company’s Feed for Growth milk replacer and Lamlac brand marketing lead, she has studied successfully for a Master’s degree in Marketing and Leadership at Cranfield University. During the course of her studies she won the Director’s Prize for her thesis, which focused on what is important to the customer when it comes to buying a milk replacer.

Sam strives to put customers at the heart of the business. She enjoys working closely with colleagues in R&D, product formulation and the field-based account management team to ensure the market product and service offering from Volac Milk Replacers Limited meets and exceeds performance expectations from farmers in GB and Ireland.

As a qualified boxing coach, she is also used to keeping the local children she teaches firmly on their toes and reactive to whatever is thrown at them. In any remaining hours she has left for herself, she enjoys travel and scuba diving with her husband, and running with their dogs.