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@specialityfood set up a milk float delivery service providing whole, unhomogenised milk to local villages. As well as the milk float delivery service we also have The Cheese Hatch where we sell cheese from the building, like most French artisan cheese businesses. This has become hugely popular since lockdown and we have extended our range to include bottled milk and kefir.” Amongst this reangling of business was a need to radically rethink production processes. “We had to keep going as we had livestock and cheese that needed daily care but the business has changed dramatically,” says Hugh Padfield of Bath Soft Cheese. “We changed the way we worked to make it less likely we’d catch the disease. We completed a risk assessment on all parts of the business. We split into different teams working on different days, created posters with key advice, provided PPE and set up wash stations by each entrance.” A new chapter for cheesemakers The efforts of the artisan cheese sector are worth celebrating – and have shone the spotlight on the “interconnectivity” of the industry, says Caroline Bell of Shepherds Purse. “It’s obvious in a way, and we all know our ecosystem, but this has illuminated how important it is to deeply understand where we each fit in the chain, and how we impact on each other.” Shepherds Purse supported its struggling sheep milk farmers by accelerating the launch of its new-format Fettle cheese, which has been received well by retailers and customers alike.”If anything,” she says, “[Covid-19] has accelerated plans and made us even more determined and committed.” Wensleydale Creamery took on the challenge of supplying the local community with local food and drink from a number of producers – including its own cheese – through a new mail order business, offering valuable doorstep delivery. Julie Cheyney of St Jude “cannot stress enough [her] admiration and appreciation for those cheesemongers and shops who reinvented themselves into online sellers”. While investments such as e-commerce systems were not viable for her business, “I was relieved and delighted when they started asking me for more cheese. This was a positive moment, uplifting and feeling like we were in step, working to support each other,” she says. Hugh Padfield of Bath Soft Cheese also admires the ingenuity of the industry professionals around him: “Everyone’s job has changed significantly, they have all risen to the challenge and made it happen,” he says. Perhaps a result of this collective stepping-up, “incredibly, sales across the business have actually exceeded the same period last year.” 26 ceased, retailers rationalised their ranges and deli counters closed, impacting our traditional cut cheese sales. Our popular Visitor Centre, which attracts over 350,000 tourists a year, had to close overnight,” says Sandra Bell of Wensleydale Creamery. Rory Stone of Highland Fine Cheese experienced similarly sizeable challenges. “Our business trades on 70% food service, bits of cheese no less than half a kilo for deli counters and cheese boards, but with no one serving food we were facing catastrophe, redundancy, insolvency,” he explains. However, the business’s ecosystem stepped in: “luckily most of our customers were both innovative and entrepreneurial. Wholesalers who were left with a vastly reduced customer base but lots of vans, stock and drivers started doing home deliveries, and ‘click and collect’ along with some mail order work. Our farmers made every effort to help too, they dried off cows, went to multi suckling, left calves on and bought in orphaned lambs, anything to use up the spare milk because we had nowhere to put it.” In the West Country, Quicke’s experienced “an immediate stop to the 40% of sales that go into food service,” explains Mary Quicke. The business also saw a drop in deli counter sales, but a welcome increase in pre-pack sales and a “huge” increase in online – a 10-15% boost. “My sales fell off the cliff,” says Julie Cheyney, maker of St Jude. Her lone staff member, Blake, “was furloughed immediately and was away for six weeks. In the first three precarious weeks I stopped making cheese but instead spent time selli ng what I had in the ripening rooms.” In time, tentatively, Julie began producing in small quantities, all the while “feeling more than anxious.” While some cheesemakers paused production – perhaps indefinitely – some stepped far out of their comfort zone in the name of business survival. “We’ve done things I never thought we’d do!” says Rose Grimond of Nettlebed Creamery. “I used to have a golden rule that we wouldn’t sell milk or do deliveries, and during the coronavirus lockdown we have Relationships are already close in the cheesemakingworld. But the crisis hasmeant that we’ve talked a lotmore tomany more of our suppliers and customers in amuchmore incisive yet also, dare I say it, emotional way. It’s brought evenmore humanity and transparency to business conversations, and relationships have deepened and strengthened as a result CAROLINE BELL, SHEPHERDS PURSE Our popular Visitor Centre, which attracts over 350,000 tourists a year, had to close overnight SANDRA BELL, WENSLEYDALE CREAMERY QUICKES EXPERIENCED A 40% STOP IN FOODSERVICE SALES AND A HUGE BOOST TO ONLINE SALES (10-15%) ENTERING THE ‘NEW ERA’ OF SPECIALITY RETAIL Establishments must look to reformed selling methods while simultaneously promoting the quality, connection and experience that they stand for A s cheesemakers and dairy farmers have faced unprecedented challenges in the wake of Covid-19, so too have retailers large and small. With some cheesemakers ceasing production, at least temporarily, there was a pause on some cheeses coming into stores, and it was also necessary for retailers to invest in improving – or establishing – e-commerce capabilities. Some establishments with multiple arms to the business felt the effects in a myriad of ways. For example, Patricia Michelson of La Fromagerie heads up an eating-in element to the retail sites as well as a wholesale business: “a large slice of the whole business, without customers to take the stock held.” Footfall was suddenly a serious consideration, and in an area usually buzzing with potential customers – Bloomsbury, London – Patricia found that it was smartest to close the shop down entirely in the absence of local office workers and other shops nearby. Meanwhile, in Suffolk, Clare Jackson of Slate Cheese found the start of lockdown “an exhausting and worrying whirlwind of change as we reacted to and processed the daily unfolding of this unprecedented situation.” For a small business located in a tourist-heavy town suddenly experiencing much- reduced footfall, the impact was heavy but the business’s focus was on the safety of its team and customers through “new risks and guidance to be addressed, and new procedures to be developed and implemented.” Amongst the difficult weeks and months, the suddenly-smaller team remained passionate about its cause to support small-scale producers and celebrate great quality cheese, but the scars will be felt for a long CLARE JACKSON SLATE CHEESE PATRICIA MICHELSON LA FROMAGERIE COMMENT