Haystack Mountain goat dairy gears for growth

LONGMONT – Jim Schott originally envisioned a herd in the range of 50 to 75 goats.

He hoped his company, Haystack Mountain Goat Dairy Inc., would make cheeses comparable to those produced in France. Ideally, Alfalfa’s stores in Denver and Boulder would carry the dairy’s products.

Despite a lack of business experience, Schott exceeded those goals. Exhibiting at as many as 11 farmers’ markets weekly, Haystack Mountain introduced its cheeses to consumers, and they bought it. So did restaurants and retailers from San Francisco to New York City.

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By 2001, cheeses from Haystack Mountain were winning national awards.

Under Schott’s leadership, the family-owned enterprise has increased its revenues every year since its founding.

When mass producers entered the goat cheese market, Schott focused his company on limited-production specialty cheeses that emphasize natural flavors, and Haystack Mountain flourished.

Recently, the company acquired a 32-acre Boulder County property and leased an additional 48 acres of pasture. It will build a new nursery and creamery, introduce sustainable farming and cheese-making practices and grow the herd from 200 to about 800 by 2011. It plans to double the size of its creamery in Longmont and has opened a production facility in Oklahoma.

Haystack Mountain employs 25 people, and it expects to double its staff by 2011.

Business grown beyond founder

Schott, who projected that Haystack Mountain will do about $8 million in business within five years, is no longer at the helm.

“I realized I’d grown the business beyond me,” he said. “I had good people managing the herd and taking care of the financials and the marketing, but I was out of my depth.”

In late 2006, Tim Overlie, previously with Wild Oats Markets Inc., became chief executive of Haystack Mountain. “He knows cheeses, and he has a long history with the natural foods world,” Schott said.

Although he no longer has day-to-day management responsibilities, Schott continues as chairman – a role he said he is learning on the job.

Haystack Mountain is raising $600,000 in private funding to support its expansion. The new dairy, to be located near the intersection of 63rd Street and Oxford Road, requires considerable capital. A local bank will provide a loan for the debt portion of the funding.

Local natural foods experts are funding as well as advising Haystack Mountain, according to Schott. “The investors believe in what we do,” he said. “They’re not looking for a quick return on their money.”

The minimum equity investment is $20,000.

Organic operation

Both the new facility and its products will be organic. The new dairy “will have as little impact on the land as possible,” according to Overlie.

The company plans to compost solid waste from the goats, perhaps also selling organic fertilizer as a secondary product. “Waste and wastewater will not leave the property,” Overlie said.

Like cows, goats produce methane gas, which many think contributes to global warming. Haystack Mountain is investigating use of a methane digester that would divert that energy to fuel the creamery’s boiler.

The creamery will have a rooftop photovoltaic system to tap enough solar energy to produce half of the electricity it needs. Solar energy will also heat water at the plant.

At the new dairy, Haystack Mountain plans to continue to produce farmstead cheese, which the American Cheese Society defines as products “made with milk from the farmer’s own herd … on the farm where the animals are raised.”

As part of its expansion plans, the company anticipates buying milk from other sustainable goat farms in the region. Overlie said he wants to inspire the formation of natural and organic goat dairies in adjacent Weld and Larimer counties.

What Haystack Mountain is doing “can be replicated elsewhere, though not in Boulder County because of the cost of land,” Overlie said.

Haystack Mountain produces a range of cheeses, some based on raw milk from its own herd. Others use “gently pasteurized” milk that may come from other herds. Pasteurization, which involves heating the milk, destroys enzymes. That makes some of the more complex cheese flavors impossible, Overlie said.

At normal breeding rates, the Haystack Mountain herd will produce more goats than the firm needs for cheese production. The excess, according to Overlie, will be grass-fed and sold as organic meat for human consumption. In the U.S., growing Hispanic, Muslim, Caribbean and Chinese populations are raising the demand for goat meat.

Despite all of the changes, Haystack Mountain adheres to certain traditions. It will continue naming each goat born on the property. It will also continue to welcome visitors. The new dairy, Overlie said, will offer better facilities for viewing and interacting with the goats.

Finally, in introducing its Oklahoma-produced Gouda to Colorado, Haystack Mountain will return to its roots. Within a few weeks, shoppers at farmers’ markets here will be able to sample Haystack Mountain’s new “Artisanal Oklahoma Goat Cheese.”