Ethics & Values

Create a Quality Local Product
It is important to us that we are able to not only give the Island a variety of cheeses but to give them a variety of quality cheeses. This is why when we started we attended two cheesemaking courses at Reaseheath Agricultural College in Cheshire and have had cheese technologists down for site visits since so that we can carry on learning.

It was incredibly important for Rich, the cheesemaker, to fully understand the science behind how cheese is made, so that quality and consistency could be achieved. 4 years in, Rich still regards himself as a relative novice in cheesemaker's years but reminds himself that he's 4 years more experienced than the day he started.

Be Sustainable
As a rural business we are well aware of our environmental and ecological responsibilities. We're proud to say that the milk travels a mere 25 feet from where the cows are milked in the dairy to our cheesevat.  We try and source as much of our raw materials and supplies from the Island, and we have moved to make our packaging more environmentally friendly by using cardboard and wooden boxes that are biodegradable.

All packaging and handling of the cheeses is done on site too, so the only time the cheese leaves the farm is when it is due to be sold or delivered. This helps minimise our carbon impact, and we will continue to look at ways in which we can make this smaller in the future.

On the whole, we look at sustainability of our business on every level. Fundamentally, we believe that if we can provide a quality local product that is affordable while making our customers happy then hopefully they will continue to support us.

Support the Supplying Farmer
Before we started in 2006 we were aware that the profit in small scale UK dairy farming was quite minimal. This is one of the reasons that in Britain, we've seen so many artisan cheese companies spring up in recent years, as farmers look to diversify and find ways to add value to their milk.
  Running a dairy farm on the Isle of Wight is made even more difficult with the added costs associated in getting materials to the Island and the milk off of it for processing.

So our idea was quite simple. Create a cheese company on the Island that could use all of the surplus milk available from the farm we were based on, and most importantly – give the dairy farmer a better price for his milk than the collecting tanker would.

We hoped that this would be an added cost to us that we could absorb so long as our customers were aware that by paying that bit extra for a quality local cheese, they would be supporting not only the cheesemaker, but also the dairy farmer who supplies us. This way, we could at least give what we all agreed was a fair price, in return for top quality, fresh local milk that was entirely traceable.