For a craft producer, everything should be based on love for oneself, one’s work and one’s product, – Tetiana Dyadechko
30 April 2024 15:20
MOTHER OF THE BRAND
Tetiana Dyadechko makes craft cheese. She has been successfully running a dairy business for 10 years and created the first Cheese School in Ukraine. The war forced her to go overseas… Tetiana used this time to return to Ukraine with new knowledge to resume her favourite business. In a blitz interview with "Komersant Ukrainian", the heroine of the MamaBrand project spoke about the basics of scaling and the main rules of the craft business.
Tetiana, you started your business in a rented apartment in Kyiv, with no experience as a cheesemaker, and started selling cheese on the third attempt. After 1.5 years, you had regular customers and later opened the Kozachka cheese factory in Poltava region, whose products were sold in supermarkets across Ukraine. What was the reason for choosing this business area and how did you manage to scale up so quickly?
The choice of this niche came out of the blue, and I can definitely say that it was love at first sight. After graduation, I worked for a large agricultural company and had a business trip to a conference in Israel. It was summer, it was hot, and the topic of the event was far from my profession… Well, apparently, it was clearly read on my face, because one of the organisers came up to me and said: “I see you are sad here.” “Yes, I am, I was travelling, thinking I would see cows, and here I am sitting in a hot hall…” On the second day, he took us to a goat farm, but at first I wasn’t very interested because I was working with cows. But then we came to the cheese dairy, and my interest was aroused. That farm was run by a husband and wife, and they did it with so much love and mutual respect for each other, for the product, for the animals, and for the guests – this atmosphere stirred something inside me. I thought that I also want to live like that and be happy in my work.
And so, in fact, it happened. After Israel, two years later, I quit my job, moved to Kyiv, and couldn’t settle down for a long time. It was a period that I can call “hitting rock bottom”. I had no incentive to even wake up in the morning. I really prayed: “God, please tell me how I can be useful to this world.” One day the thought came to me – cheese! And in a few days I was making my first cheese in the kitchen, buying milk with my last penny. That was the beginning.
What was the key to rapid scaling? Firstly, I had to survive. And my meticulousness and nerdiness, my attention to detail – these were the keys to scaling. In addition, I am a maximalist: when I cooked my first head of cheese in the kitchen, I already dreamed that my cheese would be sold all over the world. Therefore, such bold dreams, confidence and attention to detail made it possible to develop.
During the full-scale invasion, you managed to work as a cheesemaker in Switzerland and the United States and understand the basics of doing business there. And your cheese-making school has students from all over the world. What are the significant differences between Western markets and the Ukrainian one, from approaches to doing business to specific consumer demands? Where would you like to develop this gastronomic culture?
I’ll start with the last question. Definitely in Ukraine. Now I have a certain background of previous business failures, and I am preparing myself in real terms and financially, in particular, to actively develop this gastronomic culture in Ukraine. I hope to start implementing this in 2025.
As for different markets, I’ll start with the US. I think the American market is the most difficult in the context of craft production, and especially craft cheese making. Because the culture of cooking and eating at home is quite low. Immigrants, of course, bring an understanding that cooking at home is tasty, healthy, and emotionally important, and it unites the family, but Americans themselves still mostly do not eat at home.
Also, America is still more focused on large-scale businesses. Craft is very difficult for them, they have neither government support nor grant programmes. The only thing they have is access to convenient loans at 2-3% per annum. This is, of course, a big plus there. However, craft products in America are very expensive.
For example, the average price of a kilogram of raclette cheese in Switzerland is 24 francs, while in America, hard cheeses are sold for $65.
Speaking of Switzerland, there is, of course, government support, many different subsidies and payments. The communes support local, especially mountain, cheese factories. In addition, Switzerland has a very developed culture of consuming local products. We sold all the cheese I made in the rural mountainous area there in the nearby villages. And people were grateful, shaking hands for the opportunity to buy this authentic local cheese, which you can’t find on supermarket shelves.
So in Switzerland, everything is much easier, more profitable and faster in terms of cheese gastro culture.
But you know, at the age of 40, I don’t see myself anywhere else but in Ukraine. Yes, I was forced to live abroad for a year and a half, but I wouldn’t trade my country. At home, we are all family, we grew up on the same land, on the same stories, films, cartoons, fairy tales, and this is something that you cannot find or buy anywhere else for any money. This is important to me, so I see the development of cheese gastro-culture, of course, in Ukraine.
You teach how to create craft cheeses and share your own secrets with the students of your Cheese School. In fact, this is a rather narrow niche, and you are nurturing new specialists. Can your students become your competitors in the market?
Yes, my students are already cheesemakers and my full-fledged competitors. And now I’m inviting my students to the Cheese, Food and Wine Festival, which will take place in Kyiv on 18-19 May.
But I must have been born to be a teacher, because I like it so much that I don’t and won’t see my students as competitors. I see my path in teaching as well. Of course, it is connected with cheese production. And although this niche is quite narrow today, I know how to make it wider.
Among other things, I am talking about involving former military personnel in this business, who will be able to acquire new skills and even undergo rehabilitation at the same time, because this business involves significant development of hand motor skills.
Your business advice to craft producers: what should they look for when starting their own business and what are the most effective steps to develop their own brand?
Firstly, if you have an idea to make cheese, sausage, chocolate, if you already have this dream, it means that you have all the resources, knowledge and opportunities to make it happen. Once you have it, you have to act. If you think about it a lot, live it, it means you are ready. As we say: eyes fear, hands do. All the answers will come in time, the main thing is to take action.
It is also important to pay attention to the little things. When you represent your own brand and are its owner, all your attention should be focused on your own business. Where there is attention, there is energy.
If you are scattered, trying to combine your main job with your own business, it will take a very long time to develop, and you will not have rapid success. You need to be both a dad and a mum to your business. And success is in the details, both for small and large businesses.
For small businesses, and this is very important, the main thing is love. You need to love what you do, to put important meanings into your business. For craft production, money cannot be the main motive at all. Money is important, of course, you need to be able to calculate it, to be economically educated, but for a craft producer, everything should be based on love: for yourself, your work, your product. Respect it, pay attention to it. If I didn’t love making cheese, which is hard work, I wouldn’t have done it a long time ago. But cheese making has become the meaning of my life.
Of course, I have a personal life, hobbies, friends, but cheese has become a job and a hobby that connects me with friends, my family, and my circle of people.
So love for your product and work is the foundation. I think this is my most important recommendation.
