The architect of one of the most successful cheese marketing campaigns on the continent, Christoph Kempter, has left his post as managing director of the Swiss cheese concern Appenzeller Kase. Despite difficult times for Swiss cheeses, not least because of the spiralling value of the Franc against the Euro, Kempter increased sales by the equivalent of almost 100 tonnes of cheese every year during his five years as director. In 2011 Appenzeller Kase, a union of 60 village cheesemakers in the mountainous Appenzell, StGallen and Thurgau cantons of northeastern Switzerland, managed to market around 9000 tonnes of the protected designation raw milk cheese, with a good 60% of production exported.The main customer is Germany, buying three-quarters of the exported cheese, followed by France and then Italy.

Core of Kempter’s Appenzeller sales campaign was the naturalness of the tangy cheese, produced by small-scale mountain farmers and washed regularly during four to six months of maturing with a secret solution containing Alpine herbs, plant roots and flowers. Christoph Kempter took his hat, it is understood, because of differences in management opinion as to future marketing strategies.