Once again, Tillamook Creamery is making Oregon proud. This year, Dairy Foods Magazine gave the coveted “Processor of the Year” award to the Tillamook County Creamery Association.
Dairy Foods talked about how the creamery co-sales op’s have grown, how it cares for its stakeholders, and how it takes care of the environment. The co-op is one of the oldest food brands in the U.S. It has been around for more than 100 years.
Thomas Stillwell set up the town of Tillamook in 1861. Residents quickly realised that it would be hard to find a better place to make dairy products. The land is fertile and gets a lot of rain because it is close to the coast of Oregon. When you add in the relatively flat terrain, it is a great place for cattle to graze.
The Tillamook County Creamery Association was started by a group of local farmers in 1909. They wanted fair rates and better prices for getting their goods to the market.
This isn’t the first time the creamery has won an award in recent memory. The “Target Vendor of the Year” award for food and drinks went to Tillamook.
Just in big box stores, Tillamook’s business has grown by a huge amount. In 2016, the company did business with Target worth $8 million. This year, just at Target, that number has grown quickly to almost $60 million in retail sales.
Tillamook is different from most other American dairies. The co-op has been able to grow for itself and its shareholders while still being sustainable. It gets high marks for being a single source and caring about the environment.
The co-op is a certified “B Corporation” that takes care of the environment very seriously. The cooperative said that by 2030, it wants to only use 100% sustainable and recyclable packaging and have net-zero carbon emissions.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Tillamook is also seen as a rare success story in the dairy industry. Farmers all over the country dumped milk because getting rid of it was a logistical nightmare, but Tillamook farmers were sure where to send their loads. This is because of the way Tillamook does business. All of its products are made and packaged at the same place, making them ready for sale. As dairy products disappeared from store shelves across the country, Tillamook’s sales went up by an average of 50%.
Tillamook has a corporate culture that has roots in the area, which is different from many companies in the market today. The family of CEO Patrick Criteser has been in Oregon since the state was founded. His ancestors moved to Oregon in the 1860s, just a few years after it became a state. Tillamook is an Oregon institution that has been around for as long as the state itself.
If you want to see the creamery for yourself, a new visitor centre opened in 2019, and the process of making cheese has been on display to the public since the 1940s.
At the next International Dairy Show, which will be held in Orlando, Florida, Tillamook will be given the “Processor of the Year” award.
