The Swiss Cheese Mafia

Erik Devaney
ThinkGrowth.org
Published in
14 min readNov 14, 2015

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In 1999, it all came crumbling down.

An empire.

Or more accurately, a monopoly.

For 85 years, a single organization maintained near absolute, top-to-bottom control over one of Switzerland’s most sacred industries: Cheese.

Officially known as the Schweizer Käseunion (Swiss Cheese Union), this group did everything in its (unrivaled) power to ensure the continued prosperity of the Swiss cheese industry — from regulating cheese prices, to monitoring cheese quality, to marketing cheese both domestically and abroad … to committing cheese fraud and scamming the Swiss government out of millions.

Alright, we’re getting a bit ahead of ourselves here. So let’s take a quick step back.

Oh, Hey. It’s Switzerland.

Land of a Thousand Cheeses

You may know Switzerland for its rich, tasty chocolates. Or for its high-end watches. Or for its gold-filled banks. Or for its Army’s little red knives with those foldable blades, corkscrews, and other gadgets.

But of all the industries that factor into Switzerland’s economy, its cheese industry is by far the most intriguing.

For starters, the cheese industry in Switzerland is old. Ancient, really. As author Judy Ridgway…

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Written by Erik Devaney

Full-time stay-at-home dad, part-time ghostwriter, retired pub musician, recovering marketer

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