By Janet Fletcher

Move over, fresh goat cheese. Make room for goat crottins, goat blues, goat Camemberts and the rest of the gamut of goat cheeses that American producers are now making. Laura Chenel may have started a revolution 25 years ago with her simple, fresh chèvre, but today’s cheesemakers are taking goat’s milk in many other directions.

“Fresh chèvre is a commodity now,” says Steve Schaefer, cheese manager for Dean & Deluca in St. Helena, Calif. “The market has moved from being just about fresh chèvre to people having to distinguish themselves.”

America’s top cheese merchants know they have to carry a fresh, rindless goat cheese to accommodate shoppers who need some for a recipe or who like its mild nature. But savvy retailers now realize they need to stock a range of chèvres (the French word for goat cheeses of all types) to differentiate their cheese offerings from those of the nearest supermarket.

The Next Level: Complex and Aged
In recent years, domestic producers have stepped up to the plate, creating chèvres in every style from bloomy rind to washed rind, from unctuous triple creams to hard aged cheeses. “I don’t think you could get into the market with just fresh goat cheese anymore,” says Mary Keehn of California’s Cypress Grove Chèvre, whose aged, ash-laced Humboldt Fog is an industry standard bearer. “When we get new customers for goat cheese, it’s because they want the aged cheese.”

Goat cheese has always been the domain of small producers in this country, says Giles Schnierle of The Great American Cheese Collection, a Chicago distributor. It’s a relatively inexpensive business to enter, and making a decent fresh goat cheese takes no great skill. But getting to the next level—making more complex, aged cheeses and building broader distribution—is something few have had the resources to do.

They may be forced to soon, says Schnierle, if they hope to survive.

“We’re just beginning to see larger herds of goats managed by people who are not lifestyle-change people,” says Schnierle. “They’re people who’ve had experience managing animals and know how to handle 3,000 goats.” This change will bring goat milk prices down, permitting large-scale production of fresh chèvre and putting pressure on the small producers to make something else.

Many already are (see sidebar, p. 40), with outstanding results. “Capriole is fantastic, an amazing cheese,” says Clark Wolf, a New York restaurant consultant and cheese aficionado. “And Lazy Lady’s pyramid—ohmigod, is it good. And so is anything you can get from Andante Dairy.”

Enthusiasm Sells
For retailers, the challenge lies in introducing these often-unfamiliar aged cheeses and getting consumers to swallow the price. Even with the weak dollar, American goat cheeses are often costlier than their French counterparts. Successful retailers say the keys are staff training, signage and sampling.

“When somebody walks in the door, we immediately put a piece of cheese in their mouth,” says Andrea London of The Cheese Shop in Carmel, Calif. London also involves her staff in buying decisions, so that the people behind the counter will be enthusiastic about what’s in the case. “We have 200 to 300 cheeses at any one time,” says London, “and if (staffers) don’t like something, they’re not going to sell it.”

Cheese clerks also need to learn how to monitor a goat cheese’s progress, because many types are not long-lived. Good retailers make sure their ripest cheeses move. “You have to say, ‘What are my priorities today?’” says Schaefer. “You’ve got to be a cheesemonger and convey your enthusiasm for a range of cheeses, not just your favorites.”

Evocative Descriptions and Focused Promotions
Creative signage can lure customers to little-known goat cheeses, hooking them with a story or evocative description. “People want to know, ‘Is this like a Brie?’” says Laura Werlin, the California author of two books on American cheese. Use signage to compare the cheese to one that shoppers might know, or to tell them that it’s local or made by a producer they trust. London says that Purple Haze, a flavored goat cheese from Cypress Grove, might not sell on its own but “rides on the coattails” of Humboldt Fog, which her customers know.

Consider passive sampling beyond the cheese counter. “I’ve noticed at Whole Foods that they’re putting samples of cheese in the produce section,” says Werlin. A goat gouda, available for sampling by the apples, can make two sales. “It’s total cross-merchandising,” she says. “It gives people a context.” Werlin also suggests using American goat cheeses in prepared foods and sandwiches, and listing the cheeses by name.

Focused promotions can also build an audience for these little-known cheeses and for the whole category. At the West Point Market in Akron, Ohio, employees stage a goat festival every year. The local goat cheese producer brings a few of her animals to the store, and other departments pitch in. “The bakery will do a cheesecake with goat cheese,” says Cheese Department Manager Diana Bole, “and the deli will do macaroni and goat cheese.” The promotion moves product, notes Bole, and helps introduce goat cheese to the many shoppers who think they don’t like it.

America’s Forte
In some markets, price remains an obstacle to better sales of artisan goat cheeses. If the producer has no distributor and cheese has to be ordered direct, shipping can be prohibitive. Some retailers are counting on the weak dollar to make these cheeses more competitive with imports. “It seems to me there’s an opportunity for American artisan cheese makers, particular goat cheese makers, to broaden their market now that the euro is high,” says Peter Van Seters, cheese buyer for A Southern Season in Chapel Hill, N.C.

Schaefer says he will be ordering some American goat cheeses, like the washed-rind Mont St. Francis from Capriole, that formerly seemed too expensive. “Five months ago, I had one cheese approaching $40 a pound,” says the merchant. “Now I’ve got about 20, so that leaves room for a lot of the fancy aged American goat cheeses to get the price they’ve been looking for.”

Fortunately, consumer attitudes about goat cheese have broadened along with the producers’ repertoire. “I remember a time in this business when people wouldn’t touch goat cheese,” says Ken Skovron, owner of Darien Cheese and Fine Foods in Darien, Conn. “But they’ve traveled more and their palates are more open. I don’t think they’re excluding goat cheese in any way now.”

If they are, they are missing some of the country’s finest artisan foods. “I think it’s America’s forte,” says Todd Schriver, American cheese specialist at Katzinger’s in Columbus, Ohio. “I think we do goat cheese better than any other cheese.”

Janet Fletcher writes for the San Francisco Chronicle and is the author of The Cheese Course.