The Twenty - Five Things That Made Genesee County Famous
Number 23
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Bennington, NY Factory in 1924 |
Kutter's Cheese Factory
Kutter’s Cheese Factory was started by German immigrant, Leo Kutter, on March 1, 1947. Kutter, a cheese maker by trade came to America in 1923. He worked at Hasselbeck Cheese Company in Bennington, Wyoming County, New York.
In 1947, Kutter opened Kutter’s Cheese Factory on Route 5 in Pembroke. His son, Richard, began working there in 1948 and the company started to distribute cheese to stores and restaurants all over the region. In 1954, Leo was joined by his second son, Tony, and the business continued to grow.
Their core products include cheddar, muenster, colby, edam, gouda and havarti. Throughout the 1960s, product lines grew to include sour cream dips and cottage cheese. Sales increased and more employees were hired. Today, they also make Kosher cheese products and curds.In 1998, Richard and Tony retired and Kutter’s Cheese Factory was purchased by Yancy’s Fancy. Today, they employ 45 people who make 30,000 pounds of cheese 24 hours a day, five days a week.
How did this Make Genesee County Famous?
Kutter’s Cheese is available throughout the United States. It is available in retail locations and can be purchased online and shipped anywhere in the United States from the store at 857 Main Road. Printed on all the cheese labels for both Kutter’s and Yancy’s Fancy is the mailing address of Corfu, New York.
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Kutter's Cheese, 1950s |
Tony Kutter is active in outreach to farmers in Russia. Over the past twelve years, he has been there 31 times with a group called Aid For International Development. During communism, the central government was paying the collective farmers a lot more than the value of the crops. Villages of people would work about 15,000 acres of land. After the fall of communism, collective farms failed because the farmer’s subsidy stopped and farmers suffered. Farms were privatized, and today they are much smaller at about 125 acres.
Tony Kutter went to Russia to help put together cheese plants. He has assisted
Russian cheese manufactures in new product development and marketing. He has
taught numerous seminars at Russian agricultural universities to improve quality,
efficiencies and to teach the latest manufacturing technology to Russian cheese
makers.
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Kutter's Today |
Photos courtesy of Tony Kutter
Links:
Kutter's
Cheese Factory Retail Store
Photographic
History of Kutter's Cheese (More Photographs)
Yancey's Fancy
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