I first visited Arran on family holidays as a child and more recently came with my wife Margo for weekend trips to my Mum’s caravan at Cordon.
In February 2003 we made the momentous decision to sell up and move to the Island with our 1 year old daughter Alice.
On 7 April 2003 we purchased Island Cheese Company from Ian and Alison McChlery, who had founded the company in 1991 and established a fantastic product and business.
Back in those days we only had two members of staff plus ourselves, one of whom, Linzi is still with us today and has been our Manager for several years. We now have a total of 7 employees on a permanent basis plus seasonal workers during the busier periods.
In the early years my son Neil created our website and online shop, and we also started attending various Farmers Markets on the mainland.
In 2004 we welcomed the arrival of our son Euan. In this year we also purchased Bellevue Cheese Company where Calum produces our Award Winning Arran Blue, Arran Mist (Brie) and Camembert Cheeses.
We are now known as Arran’s Cheese Shop and the company continues to go from strength to strength, we are still involved in Farmers markets and our cheese can also be found at various exhibitions, x-mas markets, specialist food shops, deli’s, farm shops and restaurants.
Margo’s brother Gordon sells our cheese at about 12 farmer’s markets per month and he is often assisted by his son Andrew, daughter Eilidh and sometimes his parents. Even our 12 year old daughter Alice enjoys the odd shift in the cheese shop to earn some extra money, Euan is still thinking about it!
My motto – Make a first class product every time, employ good people, and treat customers and staff the way I would like to be treated myself.
Gordon Kinniburgh