Thursday, May 24, 2018

Saputo buys niche-market cheese company


Saputo, Canada’s largest dairy processing company, is buying one of Canada’s smallest cheese makers – Shepherd Gourmet Dairy Inc. of St. Marys.

Shepherd Gourmet is famous for feta cheese and Skyr Icelandic-style yogourt.

Saputo is paying $100 million for the company that was founded by Stewart Cardiff and now employs about 90 people.

Shepherd Gourmet had sales last year of about $57 million.

Cardiff left agriculture banking to launch the company in Tavistock, recognizing the demand for imported feta and some other cheeses and yogourt that he felt he could produce.

He started with milk from sheep at his family’s farm near Brussels, but then branched out to several types of milk.