History

1946: Brothers Georges and Eli De Laere start a slaughtering business for both small and large livestock. They mostly service local butchers.

1970: Guido De Laere, Georges’ son, takes over the business along with wife, Christiane Lindeboom and invests in the slaughter house and cutting process. He specialises in pork processing and targets overseas retail markets.

1984 and 1988: Ann and Kris, Guido and Christiane’s daughter and son, join the business. Later, both their spouses, Guy and Caroline, also join the business.

1991: Move to new buildings in Tielt. The name changes from ‘Export Slachthuis De Laere’ to ‘delavi’ - a combination of ‘De Laere’ and ‘Viande’. From then on, slaughter is co-realised with two local partners. delavi now focuses solely on the cutting, deboning, packaging and distribution of pork.  

1996: delavi starts working in the new offices, with a new freezer. The deep freeze capacity is tripled overnight, to keep up with the growing export demand.

2001: First production starts in the brand new production hall which reaffirms and cements delavi’s core values of quality, health, safety and flexibility.

2004: Ann and Kris follow in their parents’ footsteps and take over the company.

2008: A new hall extends the existing building, which is used for the storage and cleaning of packaging materials.