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This article was published 09/06/2018 (2295 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Gouda things come to those who wait.

On May 1, 82 years after Bothwell Cheese was founded in New Bothwell by a group of area farmers, the internationally acclaimed cheese maker opened its inaugural standalone store in Winnipeg, at 136 Provencher Blvd.

“We’ve only been here a few weeks but we’re already drawing a fair amount of foot traffic to St. Boniface from The Forks, instead of the other way around,” says Jean-Marc Champagne who co-owns Fromagerie Bothwell with Kevin Thomson, president of Bothwell Cheese, Canada’s largest independently run cheese producer. “Because the Bothwell name is so well-known already, we’re really hoping the shop is going to become an economic driver for this part of the city.”

Champagne met Thomson in 2012 at a social function. The two became fast friends and not long thereafter, Champagne, who studied advertising at Université de Saint-Boniface, told Thomson he had a few “outside-the-box” marketing strategies to help promote his brand.

“He was totally open to what I had in mind and we ended up doing some super-fun stuff, including this crazy campsite crashers campaign, where we literally showed up at random campgrounds throughout the province, asking people who were barbecuing if they wanted some Bothwell cheese for their burgers or smokies,” says Champagne, who can’t recall a time growing up when there wasn’t a block of Bothwell cheddar or marble cheese in his family’s crisper. (His mother is originally from Ste. Anne, a neck of the woods where “it’s Bothwell or nothing,” he says with a chuckle.)

The notion for the retail store started to germinate about five years ago. After going back and forth on what a Bothwell specialty shop might look like, they spent the next while debating where an optimum setting for it would be. They eventually agreed on St. Boniface due to its central location, minutes from downtown.

Last August, they were strolling down Provencher Boulevard on their way to get a bite to eat when they spotted a for rent sign in the window of what had previously been the Soul Medicine Psychic Shoppe. Champagne called the number listed on the placard, informed the person who answered they were standing outside the property, and asked how long before he could join them.

“He brought us inside and even though it looked nothing like it does now, we could definitely see the potential,” says Champagne, noting they struck a handshake deal that evening, and began renovating the 1,200-square-foot space, situated almost at the foot of the Esplanade Riel, on Sept. 1, 2017.

‘Because the Bothwell name is so well-known already, we’re really hoping the shop is going to become an economic driver for this part of the city’– Jean-Marc Champagne 

In February, Champagne and Thomson taped posters to the windows of their establishment, boldly announcing it as the future home of Fromagerie Bothwell. Within minutes, curious types began poking their head inside, to the point Champagne finally had to lock the door so his contracted workers could go about their chores, without being peppered every 10 minutes with queries about when the store was going to be up and running.

“We hosted a family-and-friends night on April 30, and tore the posters down first thing the next morning,” he says. “Not a word of a lie, seconds after we were done removing them, people started filing into the store, telling us they were excited we were finally open for business.”

Fromagerie Bothwell stocks more than 20 varieties of Bothwell cheese, in assorted sizes. Heck, if you have a large appetite — and $379 burning a hole in your pocket — you can even go home with a 19-kilogram block of cheese. (Yes, the person behind the counter will be happy to help you lug it to your vehicle.)

“Obviously, Bothwell cheese is available in tons of retail grocery stores, but there are always going to be a few things here you can’t buy anywhere else, such as our five-year-old cheddar,” Champagne says. “Plus, because we have a commercial kitchen in the back, the goal is to become a test site for new products, where we can get real-time feedback from customers shopping in the store. We’re already thinking ahead to the next Festival (du Voyageur), when the plan is to come out with a cheese made with Caribou, which, if you’re not familiar, is kind of like fortified wine and is the official drink of Festival.”

In addition to cheese, flavoured curds and a wide variety of licensed Bothwell merchandise such as clothing and cutting boards, the shop also stocks dozens of made-in-Manitoba products, among them Smak Dab mustard, Flora & Farmer jams, Gourmet Inspirations sauces and La Cocina tortilla chips.

“Personally speaking, that’s definitely been one of the best parts of this whole process, learning about all these fantastic things that are made right here in Manitoba,” says Champagne, patting his tummy while admitting the last six months have been “fairly gluttonous,” in the name of research. “Kevin and I wanted the store to have a year-round farmer’s market feel, so we’ve spent a lot of time going to pop-up markets or events like Third + Bird, to get a sense of what’s out there. Some of what we carry we were already familiar with — like breads and croissants from La Belle Baguette or butter from Notre Dame Creamery — but others, like Happy Dance Hummus and Dr. Beetroot ketchup, were completely new to us.” (To go along with the store’s keep-it-local mantra, all the shelving at Fromagerie Bothwell was constructed out of reclaimed barn wood acquired from Manitoba farmsteads.)

With tourist season around the corner, Champagne fully expects to welcome a large number of out-of-towners who aren’t familiar with Bothwell Cheese’s storied past, or don’t know the company is a perennial champ at culinary competitions such as the British Empire Cheese Show. In case he’s not around when people start asking questions, he’s made sure all his staff members have gone on a guided tour of the plant in New Bothwell, where they were able to witness firsthand the amount of effort that goes into the finished product.

“It’s important they understand where the cheese we’re selling comes from, and get an appreciation for how it’s made. It’s also imperative they’re familiar with all our flavours, so when somebody says they’re in the mood for something different but aren’t quite sure what, they can offer suggestions,” he says, adding samples are always available for anyone having a particularly tough time making up their mind.

One more thing; Champagne laughs and says, “yeah, who would have guessed, eh?” when asked about his store’s roof-mounted mascot, which, practically overnight, has become an udder celebrity in Winnipeg’s French Quarter.

“That was a fun promo to put on but even in our wildest dreams, we never thought it would go as viral as it did,” he says, referring to the fromagerie’s name-the-cow contest, which resulted in the life-size bovine acquiring the tag Teemoo, after close to 90,000 people wheyed, er, weighed in via social media, from as far away as Finland and Australia. “We found her at Penner Farm Services in Blumenort, and it was a bit of a traffic-stopper to say the least, the day we rented a boom truck to get her up onto the roof.”

Champagne acknowledges it was too bad Teemoo hadn’t been named yet, when her namesake, National Hockey League hall-of-famer Teemu Selanne flew to Winnipeg last month to cheer on the Jets in their second round playoff series versus the Nashville Predators. That said, he’s fairly certain the Finnish Flash will be back one day, at which point he’d only be too happy to introduce Teemu to Teemoo. And, if he’s famished, offer him a slice of cheese.

David Sanderson writes about Winnipeg-centric businesses and restaurants.

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca