FDBusiness.com

Through its purchase of the Great Lakes Cheese Company’s production site at Seymour in Wisconsin, Swiss dairy group Emmi is gaining additional capacity for the production of blue cheese in the United States. The United States is Emmi’s largest foreign market, where the company primarily produces and sells cheese. The business involves both exported cheeses from Switzerland and locally produced cheeses, made predominantly from cow’s milk. It is operated under the name Emmi Roth.

Emmi has strengthened its speciality cheese segment in recent years and the acquisition of this new blue cheese plant will continue to grow these efforts. Emmi Roth’s current blue cheese portfolio includes the Buttermilk® Blue Cheese, in Original, Smoked (dubbed “Moody Blue”) and Affinée (mature) varieties. Buttermilk Blue is a premium cheese made from raw cow’s milk and aged a minimum of 60 days. Emmi Roth markets its blue cheeses for the retail and the food service sector. The addition of the plant in Seymour, Wisconsin, means that Emmi will be able to extend the value chain, and have more flexibility for Emmi Roth to develop and offer new formats and varieties of blue cheese.

The plant in Seymour has been in operation since 2005. It specialises in the production and packaging of premium quality blue cheese and produces more than seven million pounds of cheese (roughly 3.5 million kilograms). The plant also has equipment to crumble blue cheese and pack it into cups for the retail trade or larger portions for the food service sector.

The purchase includes the factory, the related land and all of the production facilities and equipment. The parties have agreed not to disclose the details of the transaction.