MOVING THE CHEESE

Thursday's Lunch

Seems like I've watched cricket and water polo matches more than anything else this past week but 'needs must' I suppose.  We did have some rather good wood-fired pizza at Sapore in Nottingham Road on Thursday night whilst escaping the dreaded load shedding and we met a lovely couple, Bronwyn & Jean Joubert, who have recently started a wine distribution company here in the Midlands which I was rather happy about!

This week appears quieter on the Under 10B front, so I've resumed my whizzing around the countryside on my quest to get fat. Today on the way back from Howick I took the Curry's Post Road to Balgowan because I needed some buffalo mozzarella (you will soon see why). I stopped off at the Indezi Creamery and Cheese Shop which didn't have any mozzarella but did have a very wide variety of artisan cheeses, both local and imported. This took me completely by surprise considering we were on such a back road. What a gem! Particularly good was the 'Indezi Blue' which I thought was like a creamy Cambozola but is made the same way as Stilton. Anyway it was wonderful, so I gobbled down half the block for my lunch along with my favourite wheat crackers and thought about cheese and cheese shops for a while.

I'm busy re-vamping our bakery menu's and recipes at the moment, which I really enjoy doing as it's a brilliant excuse to read millions of my favourite food blogs (some of which I've linked here) and fiddle around in the kitchen 'testing' things. Making artisan food is one thing, but selling it is a completely different story - as we have learnt the hard way.  Although one can have an excellent product which ticks all the artisan food boxes, creating a successful retail space is not quite so easy.

A while back I read an excellent article on La Fromagerie in the Foodie Bugle which I referred to quite a bit when setting up our bakery. Since food retailing is a bit of a dark science for me, I found the article informative on nabbing 'foot fall' and getting 'wallet share' and thought it is worth sharing:

La Fromagerie: Top Ten Tips To Be As Good As They Are  by Silvana de Soissons

1. A welcoming entrance: Well lit, good smells, signboards with information, the weekly specials at the entrance and a good 2 meter corridor of beautiful displays.
2. Friendly, knowledgeable Staff: Smartly dressed in aprons, busy, well-trained and product 'ambassadors'  
3. Full, well-labelled shelves: Information on the 3 P's: Product, Provenance and Price.  
4. Well chosen, artisan homeware: Carefully curated pieces to compliment the product (ie top of the range cheese slicer and wooden cheese boards) which customers are willing to pay a premium for.
5. Communal & private seating: Creating a comfortable cafe.
6. Eclectic, vintage and unusual finds: Adding character.
7. Central 'Wow' factor Centre of Excellence: Focal and central showcase of the shop, in La Fromagerie's case it is the Cheese Room.
8. Writing a book about your product: Authorative, personal, unique.
9. Events: Promotions such as supper clubs, lectures and tasting events.
10. Social Media: A good website, Twitter, Instagram and daily Facebook updates are essential these days.

The article is really worth a read if you are looking to create a distinctive and successful retail space - I'm certainly happy to learn from the best of them.

By the way I've heard that Indezi Cheese is going to be at our local Rosetta Farmer's Market this Saturday 14th Febraury, which is totally amazeballs. Just need to get the Joubert's there and then we can have my all time favourite thing CHEESE & WINE!