Leelanau Cheese

What we did: Updated eCommerce website, photography, and email marketing templates.

For 25 years, John and Anne Hoyt owned and operated Leelanau Cheese in Suttons Bay, Michigan where they established a local and international reputation for their cave-aged, award-winning, European style cheeses. When the Hoyts retired and sold the business to operating partners Gary Smith and Joshua Hall in 2021, the new owners wanted to modernize the business’ online presence. Their goal was to expand sales potential using eCommerce with fresh website content and design, professional photography, and email newsletter marketing.

We populated a new Shopify website with relevant content and eCommerce functionality. We also developed three newsletter templates for use in new email campaigns and provided a library of edited photos selected from a two hour onsite photoshoot. Over the course of the project, training sessions and standard operating procedures were prepared to ensure the partners’ confidence in using their new website and eCommerce system.

Since completing marketing services with Taste the Local Difference, Leelanau Cheese has increased mail order sales by a significant margin and reported the order fulfillment system is now considerably improved, allowing them to “spend less time processing, packaging, and shipping orders despite a larger volume of sales.” Consequently, they say the time savings from these improvements has allowed them “to be more agile, and as small business owners wearing many hats, that’s been a tremendous benefit.” 

“Working with Christina and the TLD team was a pleasure. We had very little experience with eCommerce let alone building and maintaining a website. Many of our specific needs were forecasted by the TLD team in advance of our initial meeting, making the development process very smooth. They were prepared, experienced, and organized. We are excited to work with them in the future!”

- Josh Hall