Claire Ambrose and Louise Putt from our Food and Drink Team, met with Ben Stansfield on a blustery day in early March at the picturesque location of the Cornish Cheese Co factory, located on the family-run farm in the Cornish countryside.
A closed road within a mile of the farm meant a last-minute diversion through more country lanes and a delightful local village where sheep were contentedly grazing in the village centre.
On reaching the farm the first thing that is noticeable is a huge array of solar panels. These are part of the drive to become sustainable and net zero by 2025, says Ben. They are currently looking at having more panels on the roof to help further.
As they have to run the fridges all night, their power consumption is high. To reduce this, they have sealable rooms and can tweak the temperatures so that they can run as efficiently as possible.
To make the cheeses, the business sources all it’s milk supplies locally. This means the milk arrives within hours of being collected to make their products as fresh as possible.
(Photo from left to right: Ben Stansfield, Phillip Stansfield, Louise Putt)
Cheeses
The company currently produce three cheeses: their best-selling Cornish Blue, their Cornish Brie and Cornish Nanny.
Ben says they hope to develop more cheeses to get five quality products to the market. These are based on five recipes that Ben’s dad, Philip, had put together.
The original plan had been to develop all five early on, but they soon found that the blue cheese mould was turning all the other cheese blue as well, so they took the decision to step back and concentrate on the Cornish Blue, whilst they perfected the recipe and found out how to avoid this happening!
Developing a new quality cheese is a long process and it will not be brought to market until it is just right. The Cornish Brie and Cornish Nanny were then introduced later on with The Cornish Brie achieving a 500% increase in sales in its first year.
The Cornish Blue, their most successful cheese to date, is a softer and creamier blue cheese which appeals to a wider audience, says Ben. It’s also very good in cooking, so any cheese that doesn’t meet the stringent standards for the cheese counters is sold off for food production (pates etc.) and cooking, which means nothing is wasted.
As the business has grown and won awards - and with it some prestigious contracts – the scale of production at the farm has had to increase alongside this.
From using 200-litre vats which were churned by hand, the business now uses three 1,200 litre vats, which are all mechanised. The production process remains very hands on, though, and the skill of the cheesemaker is very evident in all stages of the production to get the consistency, flavour and texture all right.
We were invited to look around the production lines, so donning blue hygiene hats, white coats and boot covers we entered the blue cheese production area.
Whilst nothing was being made at the time, there were cheeses in various stages of progress in each of the three cooling rooms – the precursor to the maturing room.
We then see some Cornish Brie in mid-production and venture into the maturing room. It’s all highly organised and full of cheeses in various sizes.
Despite the increase in production, the team size is relatively small, at only 8 employees at the time of our visit. This means that sick leave and annual leave have an impact on production levels.
The main priority with winning contracts with large supermarket chains is keeping on top of production levels.
Covid-19
In 2020 when the covid pandemic struck it had a massive effect on the business. Overnight many deli counters closed, along with pubs and restaurants – some of their main customers.
The business had to adapt overnight to survive. This is where Ben came into his own, quickly establishing a successful internet shop to sell online.
Production cycles are 3 months for the blue cheese and one month for the Cornish Brie, meaning that there was a lot of stock on hand when the country went into lockdown in March 2020.
The sudden loss of business meant that they were left with large stocks of cheese that needed to be sold before it went past its best. The internet sales helped with this, but covid still significantly dented sales overall.
They work alongside ‘Too Good to Go’ when they have excess stock, which helped in the pandemic, but these days they have very little waste as most goes into food production if not sold as top quality.
Philip (Ben’s dad) tells us about a lucky chance phone call from an airline food procurement company which meant that another large batch of cheese was sold, after working through the night to re-package and distribute to a tight timescale.
The closure of many deli counters also meant that suppliers had to change the sizes of cheeses being sold. Deli counters buy large cheeses and portion them up to suit consumer needs. These sizes are not desirable for the average household!
The business switched to producing some smaller cheeses and individually wrapped cheeses for direct purchase. “Developing the right packaging has been a challenge”, says Ben. The cheeses need to ‘breathe’ whilst retaining their moisture. It’s also a priority to have sustainable and ethical packaging products.
This led to a re-branding project that was run by Ben.
Working alongside a design company in Exeter, Buddy Creative, they have developed the distinctive and striking branding that you see today, which is designed to represent the high-quality fresh produce and Cornish heritage.
It was also a step move to change the name from “Cornish Blue” to “The Cornish Cheese Co” to enable them to expand their range of cheeses.
“Without covid we wouldn’t be where we are now” says Ben, as it forced them to review the business model, and Ben had time to be at home with his family to help them develop the new strategy.
Family Business
The Cornish Blue cheese has been produced on the farm since 2001. It was started by Ben’s parents, Philip and Carol Stansfield.
On the day we met Ben, both parents and sister were also working in the small farm office and Philip was on hand to help with the tour. It’s very much a family affair.
Ben has recently completed a degree in digital marketing (hence the ability to develop the online sales business) at Manchester Metropolitan University. Covid had an impact on Ben’s university experience, with him completing his final year later on, whilst still working remotely for the business.
Planning for the future
Well, Ben says, he’d love to have a proper shop at the farm (currently it’s just a shed) and they can make the most of the tourist market that way.
There’s much to do on getting new cheeses established and they are still developing the quality of the film in the packaging, as it is not allowing enough CO2 to escape and enough O2 in. Small details really but it all counts.
We come away laden with some cheeses from the small shop. The Cornish Blue really is delightful and creamy – a new top favourite of mine. The Cornish Brie – well, I’m not usually a fan (Louise really is) but it was delicious. We will both be buying much more.
For more information on Cornish Cheese Co, visit their website by clicking here.
