535-03 Page 204Page Six, The Ingersoll Times, September 18, 1974
Two of the antiques of the dairy industry which decorate the
showroom at the Village Cheese Mill in Salford. The wooden box
churn was made in Quebec and used to make butter close to 100
years ago.
Family business...
"Cheese Mill" opens
It's a family business right in
the heart of "The Cheese County"
- The Village Cheese Mill in
Salford run by Fred Gillis, his
wife Goldie and son Scott:
Opening day for The Cheese
Mill was August 15, and business
has been steadily picking up. "I
guess word has gotten around,
now. We were glad it started a
little slow because my son, Scott
and I didn't, know very much
about what, we were doing at
first," says Mrs. Gillies. She and
Scott run the store while Fred
takes care of the buying.
"My husband really knows
cheese," Mrs. Gillis said. "He'll
cut open a cheese he's bought and
say it's a nice clean one." Mr.
Gillis has been in the cheese
business most of his life. He
started working summers for his
uncle at the Pine River Cheese
Factory in Kincardine when he
was a young boy and recently had
his own dairy business producing
cheese and other products.
The Gillis family thought a long
time before they opened their
cheese outlet. They knew it would-
be a lot of work and with any
small business, there's always
the chance that it won't make it.
Three months ago they bought a
feed mill built in 1936 at the main
intersection in Salford and began
renovations on it. They now use
two rooms in the mill for storage
and the front room for the sales.
Reminders of the fiat days of
cheese in Oxford County decorate
the store. There are milk cans
and stone butter churns and even
an old box churn used in Quebec
close to 100 ,years ago.
The cheese sold at the store
comes from distributors in
Tavistock, Atwood and Wood-
stock with a few imported
cheeses on display for variety.
`Most of on- cheese is Canadian,
but if the imports sell well we
may get some more of them,"
Mrs. Gillis said.
Mr Gillis has been involved
with the Cheese and Wine
Festival since its beginning and
will be back again this year with
his family and a display of the
cheeses they sell at their store. Of
course, samples will be avail-
able.
The first retail `cheese house' outlet in the area opened in Salford on Augitst'15. The Village Cheese is
a family business with Fred Gillis buying the cheese and his wife and son selling it in the store.