No One Moved the Cheese

Reports of Wisconsin's fall from cheese leadership have been greatly exaggerated.

For nearly a decade, California producers have been on a tear, coming closer and closer to toppling the Midwest dairy giant. But now it appears that Wisconsinites can breathe easy: Their cheese-head crown is theirs for the keeping.

Wisconsin's cheese production lead over California has expanded to a healthy 30 million pounds per month, after narrowing to a nail-biting 6 million pounds a month last fall, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The reversal of fates has resulted from a combination of California plant closings and plant openings in Wisconsin.

According to the Times, the rivalry kicked off 10 years ago with an editorial by Dick Groves, owner of Wisconsin-based trade publication Cheese Reporter. Groves predicted that given its impressive schedule of plant openings, California would overtake Wisconsin in cheese production by 2005.

But now, experts like Groves say predictions of California moving into the top seat for cheese production are unlikely to come true.

California companies have struggled to deal with high labor costs and a strict permit process, while Wisconsin has worked hard to increase the milk supply needed for production expansion in that state.
California now has 61 cheese plants to Wisconsin's 124, and Wisconsin officials say the state's plants still have room for more capacity.

About half of the 9.7 billion pounds of cheese made in the U.S. come from Wisconsin and California, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, and it's an ever-growing business.

According to the U.S.D.A., per capita cheese consumption is projected to be 36 pounds per person per year by 2016, double what it was in 1981.

That may sound like a lot, but it's still less than Sweden, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, France, or Greece (at 58.7 pounds per person in 2005; that's a lot of feta) -- so export potential is also high.

Wisconsin continues to lead the nation in cheese production with 2.35 billion pounds while California continues to rank second, producing 2.29 billion pounds of cheese in 2007.

One bragging right that California has managed to scoop up: It is now the biggest American producer of Italian cheese -- especially mozzarella, the most heavily consumed cheese in the country.

Liz Gunnison