Pure. Simple. Natural. This is the slogan that Farm Life Creamery attests to and one that they are proud of. Through hard work and chasing a goal, the family farm illustrates how farms of any size can capture revenue by sharing their farm experience directly with the consumer.
Having both grown up on dairy farms, Gary and Amy Blase began dairying on their own in 1972 when they married. Their eldest son, Chad Blase, and his siblings grew up on the family’s dairy. The roots in dairy farming are deep.
Chad’s partner, Laura Klock, who is one of the owners of Farm Life Creamery in Ethan, S.D., recently joined Farming the Countryside with Andrew McCrea’s podcast to talk about the dairy and cheesemaking journey. Raised around dairy farming in Wisconsin, she says she took it for granted growing up. She met her creamery partner, Chad, and his family in 2016.
“When I met Chad, he had left his full-time job to go back to the farm,” Laura says. “His parents are getting older and wanted to slow down, and then the milk prices dropped.”
Laura shares that she found herself listening to the Blase family talk about their options to quit, sell everything, or make their own product.
“Really, that’s the only two options because you can’t go backward every day for a long time, as far as what you’re getting paid for your raw commodity,” she shares.
Understanding grant writing, Laura lead as they began digging to learn more about future options for the Blase family. They came across Chris and Scott Swanson who made artisan cheese in South Dakota as Valley Side Farm Cheese. The Swanson’s were considering getting out of cheesemaking and looking for the right buyer.
“They had the equipment we would need to get started and she had traveled around to Texas and Vermont and got some really cool training,” Laura says. “We entered a deal with them, we were able to use their facility. She taught us how to make cheese, we got some of her inventory (they have some 9 year aged Cheddar in the cave) and we just rented their facility while we were retrofitting the old farm that we’re on here in Ethan.”
Ramping Up
With a background in marketing and graphic design, Laura was also able to design their Farm Life Creamery logo. Hailing from Wisconsin, Laura is a self-proclaimed “curd nerd” and that stirred creativity.
“We didn’t see a lot of like creatively flavored fresh cheese curds in the market, and that was a great way to get started with our brand!” Laura says.
Quickly learning how to make curds, Chris had already hit farmers’ markets. Although they knew that to truly impact the Blase farm, they would need to expand beyond that and dive into retail.
From there, the team explored sampling at County Fair Food Stores in Mitchell weekly, handing out samples and that is where they feel like it paid off in the long run.
Peddling cheese curds paid off as they were selling upwards of 300 packages during a sampling event. In October of 2019, they made cheese for the first time at their own facility on farm.. They currently do farmer’s markets, as well as sell in 30 locations throughout South Dakota and in their own small Farm Store.
Downsizing from 200 cows, the Blase family is currently milking around 70 Holsteins. Laura says the keyword is that they are still milking and in the dairy business.
“It’s all starting to work out,” Laura says.
From delays including two floods in 2019 and the pandemic, which delayed the milk bottling set for about a year and a half, Laura shares that hard work has paid off, but they don’t plan on getting rich dairying this way.
“We’re never going to be millionaires doing this,” she says. “We’re pretty small. But it’s important to us that everyone is ok and that we can keep this small part of rural America alive, and share it with our communities and tourists that come through.”
Products Available
With a crowded marketplace, Laura believes they stand out because the consumer is more engaged and wants to know where their food comes from.
“People can come here, tour the creamery, and hang out with their kids to enjoy our petting farm and our mini-golf, and learn about where their food comes from and how it’s made,” she explains.
Laura says their secret ingredient is educating consumers, being open and transparent with them and letting people taste the product.
“That’s huge,” she says. “There is a taste difference for sure.”
Cheese curds allowed Farm Life Creamery to get their brand to market fast, taking the cheese directly out of the vat and delivering it fresh to others to enjoy. Today, they offer more than 45 flavored curds and introduce new flavors often. Their most popular Artisan cheddars are Five Pepper, Coffee and Sesame. The family also plans to add yogurt and ice cream soon. The creamery is the only small, on-farm, Grade A licensed bottling plant in the state of South Dakota.
To listen to the entire podcast of Laura Klock talking about capturing revenue and marketing direct to consumers, go to FTC Episode 199: Capturing Revenue by Sharing Your Farm’s Story and Marketing Direct to Consumers - Farming the Countryside with Andrew McCrea - Omny.fm
