Michael has joined forces with a Dutch partner to form Global Dairy LP. They milk 2,100 cows and supply Bel Brand’s Cheese Plant.

Demand to supply the Bel Brand’s Cheese Plant in Brookink, where the Mini Babybel snack cheeses are manufactured, is increasing as sales of Babybel snacks explode.

Bel Brands, USA, a subsidiary of the Paris based cheese manufacturer Bel Group, has built a new $144 million manufacturing facility in Brookings. The first phase started production last summer with the second phase due to start in 2017.

The cheese plant utilises 500,000 lbs of milk to produce 1.5 million Mini Babybels per day, and plan to increase output to three times that output over the 5-10 years.

Mini Babybel cheese accounts for one third of Bel Brands USA’s total sales volume. The company sold 22 million pounds (10,000 tons) of Mini Babybels in the US in 2013, a 24% increase from the previous year.

Mini Babybel is one of three popular cheese brands produced by the Bel Group. The other two are Laughing Cow and Boursin.

Michael explained that this was a traditional dairy area, but cow numbers on small farms were dying out until 2006 when a concerted effort was made by the state to bring dairy farming to a commercial level. He thinks cow numbers will double over the next number of years.

Michael is a strong advocate of having milk prices hedged for a big percentage of the annual supply.

US milk production up 2.1% as dairy herd expands