The number of dairies left making blue Stilton is set to slip to just four, after it was announced that the historic Tuxford & Tebbutt creamery in Melton Mowbray would be closing.
Parent company Arla announced that it planned to shut down the Leicestershire site, which employs 56 people and has been in operation since 1780, following a six-month strategic review prompted by a decline in speciality cheese sales.
The company will now enter a period of consultation with staff as part of the planned closure, said Arla VP of production, Fran Ball.
Tuxford & Tebbutt will be the second Stilton maker to stop production in the past four years, following the closure of the 150-year-old family business Webster’s Dairy in Leicestershire in 2020.
That will leave just four blue Stilton-makers left in the UK: Clawson in Leicestershire, Hartington in Derbyshire, and Cropwell Bishop and Colston Bassett in Nottinghamshire.
Matthew O’Callaghan, organiser of the Melton Mowbray Artisan Cheese Awards, said sales of Stilton had suffered in recent years because of its reliance on sales at Christmas. “Tastes have changed with people moving away from the traditional Christmas dinner,” he said.
Arla would not say whether it would continue to use the Tuxford & Tebbutt brand, but confirmed it would not be making Stilton in another dairy. Under the terms of the blue cheese’s Protected Designation of Origin (PDO), it must be made in Leicestershire, Derbyshire or Nottinghamshire, but Arla does not have another cheesemaking facility in any of these counties.
Earlier this year farmer-owned co-operative Arla announced it planned to invest £300m in five of its production sites in the UK, including cheese facilities in Taw Valley and Lockerbie.
This article first appeared in the August 2024 edition of Fine Food Digest.
