There’s a quiet revolution being delivered to the doorsteps of Carmarthenshire.

Milk, the daily staple of households up and down the country, is once again arriving in traditional glass bottles.

Dairies are putting it down to the Blue Planet II effect. And the return to tradition means salvation for many small family farms.

Nigel Dragone has been running Nigel’s Dairy in Carmarthen for 22 years and has recently seen an explosion in demand for both milk and fresh fruit juice in glass bottles.

Nigel, who works with son Angelo, said: “The demand keeps growing from village to village. We’re getting calls from areas as far away as Swansea, specifically asking for milk delivered in glass.

“We’re a family business and we are all about delivering what our customers want.

"Many of them don’t live close to a shop, so we offer a range of products they can get on the doorstep.”

Nigel also believes that as with many other small dairies, Blue Planet II was the game-changer that sparked the new demand for milk in glass from small dairies.

“We are selling two thirds more than before the programme,” he said.

“I thought it would be a short-lived fad, but it is still going strong. It’s even led to a demand for organic milk that just wasn’t there before.

"We now sell about 150 pints of organic milk in glass a day.”

Nigel says his customers are intent on moving away from buying plastic and believes that any difference in price doesn’t put people off.

He said: “I think they are determined to do something positive about reducing the amount of plastic in the environment and buying milk in glass bottles is one easy way they can do this.”

The future looks rosy for the dairy.

“We recently started to deliver to a village where one of our lads is based. It was his idea to extend his round there. He now sells 250 pints every Tuesday and Friday.”

A spokesman for Friends of Glass, the organisation that supports the environmental benefit of glass, said: “We’re delighted to see this upswing in doorstep deliveries of milk in glass bottles in Carmarthen.

“It’s wonderful to see this sea change in people’s attitude to sustainability. Glass bottles can be recycled hundreds of times, in fact infinitely.

"That’s why they are so much better for the environment.

“And glass is a purer material to use – it doesn’t allow any chemicals to leach into your food or drink.”