The Rural Voice, 2001-08, Page 32A LONG WAY
TO MARKET
Goat milk producers
battle through
hurdles to create
their own new
generation cheese
co-operative and
crash theft way into
the marketplace
Story and photo by
Keith Roulston
Goat milk producers (from left) Bob Reid, Tammy and Ross Cook and Brad Lindner
are among the many people it's taken to bring Mornington Dairy Heritage Cheese and
Dairy Co-operative's cheese to market.
It can be a long, long way from the
farm gate to the supermarket shelf
but a hardy group of goat milk
producers and community investors,
are proving that, despite the hurdles,
new small processing companies can
be created to process farm produce
for niche markets.
There have been many lessons
learned, but the Mornington Heritage
Cheese and Dairy Co-operative Inc.
now has cheese on store shelves and
is working to expand markets to
allow more of the producer. members
to send their goat milk to the
company for processing.
When he was shipping cows'
milk, says Ross Cook, who milked
cattle for 14 years on the family farm
just north of Stratford, his worries
stopped when the milk truck picked
up the milk and drove down the lane.
Cook switched to goats last year
when he and his wife Tammy felt the
high costs of quota and cattle made
expansion impossible.
"Now you know a little more
about the actual processing — of
making the cheese, the marketing
part of it and how to get it out to the
consumer. It's just a whole new ball
game."
Meetings of the co-op's board of
directors sometimes go on until 1:00
a.m. because there are so many issues
to be dealt with, says board chairman
Bob Reid, a journalist turned goat
farmer. "You're dealing with
transportation of the milk, quality
issues, setting up committees for
28 THE RURAL VOICE
education, distributors, wholesalers
— the list never ends, really.
"We're certainly a lot wiser than
when we started and fortunately the
enthusiasm's still there," says Reid.
"We've had a few setbacks along the
way and there seem to be crises come
along at regular intervals but you
deal with them and each one you deal
with gives you confidence.
"When you look at the whole
picture production is really pretty
easy. Getting it sold for the price you
want is the challenge," says Reid.
"Marketing is a big piece of the
pie," agrees Brad Lindner,
Mornington's general manager.
Lindner is another former dairy
cow producer who switched to goats.
He had taken over his father's 25 -
cow operation 10 years earlier. "I
k was at a cross-roads of deciding
whether to porrow money and get
bigger or,look at something else."
He'd already been contemplating
the switch to goats when he lost
about a quarter of his cows in a bout
of botulism, so rather than buy
expensive replacement stock, he
decided it was time for the switch.
Today he has 180 goats milking
but isn't currently shipping to
Mornington himself. His job is to
boost sales to the point that milk
from other farmer members like
himself will be needed to fill
demand.
"We do have a lot of leads and if
50 per cent of them come through
we'll be quite happy with the volume
we're going to get out of it," he says.
"A lot of them involve partnerships
or alliances with other companies.
It's something we think will work out
quite.well because of course we don't
have any distribution system, we
don't have any sales people, no truck
and drivers."
Reid originally got Lindner
interested in the co-op and he
attended an initial meeting in
Rostock, then volunteered to sit on
the committee. He acted as chair for
the year until January.
As chair he'd been doing some of
the work a general manager would
have been doing and he found it
interesting enough to apply for the
position when it became open. He'd
been involved in sales before taking
up farming and been involved in
farm and community groups but he'd
never been in a management position
in a company until May 1 when he
went on the payroll.
The biggest challenges are "so
much to do and so little time,"
Lindner says. As in any start-
up business there are so many areas
that need attention from sales to
problem solving. "We're in a new
plant and there are always challenges
to adjust to here, but along with that
we're looking to establish contacts
and get sales going and work with
distributors."
Mornington Heritage Cheese and
Dairy Co-operative Inc. has its roots
in the January 1999 closing of the
Millbank cheese factory by