Est. 1909
Heritage & History
The Tillamook County Creamery Association was organized in 1909 by a group of dairy farmers in Tillamook County, Oregon, who recognized that cooperating to process and market their milk collectively would produce better returns than competing individually. Tillamook County's geography — a narrow coastal valley sheltered by the Oregon Coast Range, with mild temperatures, abundant rainfall, and rich grass year-round — produced exceptional milk from cattle that could graze on pasture through most of the year. The cooperative's founders understood that this geographic advantage, translated into cheese made by local craftspeople, gave them a product worth marketing under a regional name.
The cooperative's cheesemaking reputation was established early. Tillamook cheddar won regional recognition within decades of the cooperative's founding, and the brand built a following among Pacific Northwest consumers who valued the flavor that came from Tillamook County's distinctive milk. The cooperative structure — in which the farmer-owners receive premium prices for their milk based on the success of the brand they own — has proved durable, sustaining more than 100 family farm operations through more than a century of agricultural consolidation that has eliminated most comparable regional dairy cooperatives.
Made in Tillamook, Oregon
Every pound of Tillamook cheese is made at the Tillamook Creamery in Tillamook, Oregon, using milk from the cooperative's member farms in Tillamook County. The Tillamook creamery — a large facility on the edge of town that receives milk directly from farms just miles away — processes the full cooperative's output into cheese, butter, sour cream, and ice cream, all made in Oregon and marketed under the Tillamook name.
The extra-sharp cheddar, which is aged for a minimum of nine months in the Tillamook facility, has become the cooperative's flagship product and the standard by which many American cheddar consumers judge sharpness and depth of flavor. The aging process requires consistent temperature and humidity management in the Tillamook facility's aging rooms, where tens of thousands of cheese wheels develop their flavor over months or years. Tillamook's ice cream line, made in the same Oregon facility, uses the cooperative's own cream in formulas that have built a regional following comparable to the cheese. The Tillamook Creamery visitor center draws more than a million visitors annually, making the Tillamook, Oregon facility not just a production site but a destination that connects consumers directly to the Oregon Coast dairy country where their food is made.
