At 16, Russ Kohler had no plans to take over his father’s dairy farm in Midway. He was headed to Utah State University to become an engineer, and he did just that. After building a career in engineering, Russ found the long hours kept him away from his wife and six children, and the pull of the farm grew stronger. That dream grew into a mission that would demand the effort of his entire family, and eventually save the farm, through cheese.

The Kohlers’ pivot to artisan cheese helped secure their four-generation dairy and turn it into one of Utah’s signature food destinations. Today, Heber Valley Artisan Cheese is more than a farm – it’s a gathering place for locals, a draw for visitors and a testament to how one family’s creativity and persistence preserved both their livelihood and a piece of the valley’s agricultural heritage.

It’s easy to see why Russ returned. The family’s red barn-style shop sits among green pastures with mountains in the distance, the kind of setting that invites visitors to slow down and breathe deep. Wanting to share that feeling, Russ opened the farm to the public with daily tours. Guests gather at the shop, climb aboard a tractor-pulled trailer, and ride on hay bales to the barns.

The first stop? Petting the calves. Curious little animals, one day to 10 weeks old, wander up to visitors, suckling on fingers, tugging on shirts and angling for ear scratches. Tours continue with stops at the feeding barns, the modern milking parlor and the original hand-milking barn used from 1929 until 2017. Along the way, the family shares the story of stewarding this land for four generations.

Beyond daily farm tours, guests return for cheese classes, fondue nights and seasonal tastings that turn the creamery into a gathering spot as much as a shop.

The Albert Kohler Legacy Farm lies between the Wasatch and Uinta ranges, flanked to the east by the Provo River and just over a mile from Midway’s historic downtown. The Swiss architecture and décor of the town’s main street reflect the Kohlers’ heritage. The Heber Valley was settled in the 1800s by livestock farmers, including the Swiss-immigrant Kohlers. Russ’s father, Grant, once chaired Swiss Days, the town’s harvest festival.

Sharing the farm with visitors is important to Russ, but sharing it with his family is his greatest joy. He works alongside his sisters Whitney and Amber, his mother Caralee and, until his passing in 2023, his father Grant. Grant instilled a focus on hard work, but also insisted his children make time to help others. His death left a hole in the family, and Russ feels he has big shoes to fill. Describing his father as a hero and role model, he said he tries to practice what he learned from him every day.

“I can’t tell you how many times we pulled off the work we were doing on the farm to help someone who had a flat tire, broken machine or flooded basement,” Russ recalls. Grant served for 22 years as a volunteer EMT and member of Search and Rescue with the Wasatch County Sheriff’s Office.

Farming has always been hard. The days are long, and there is no off-season. Today, challenges extend beyond the barn. As Midway and Heber have grown, farmland has given way to housing. The Kohler dairy, once surrounded by pastures, is now bordered on every side by homes. Add competition from industrial-scale dairies, and the need to adapt became urgent. For nearly 100 years, the Kohlers’ lives have centered on the 102-acre farm and its 150-plus cows. As the fourth generation to run the place, Russ never thought about giving up. As he put it, not making it was simply not an option. So, about a decade ago, the family committed to a new path – cheese.

Their pivot reflects a wider movement across Utah, where family farms increasingly rely on direct-to-consumer products to survive in the face of rising land values and industrial competition.

As the Kohlers watched small dairies across the state and country close up shop, they knew the value of Midway land would soon eclipse what a farmer could make selling milk wholesale. They began to wonder how they would even afford to feed their cows.

It was Grant who first suggested making cheese. Though the family had raised dairy cows for four generations, they hadn’t turned milk into other products. At first the idea seemed far-fetched, but Russ returned to Utah State University for training, and the family enrolled in the school’s cheese-making program. Whitney and Amber spearheaded the cheese-making team. Russ’s wife Heather created a packaging and order-filling system. Caralee became the master taster and peacemaker – making sure her children kept working together.

On April 1, 2011, the shop opened. “I like to tell people, no joke!” Russ said. They sold out on day one. In the beginning, a few hundred dollars in sales made for a good day. Now, that would count as very slow.

Trial and error followed, but good milk makes good cheese. Even mistakes became discoveries. Once, while making a cheddar, the Kohlers ended up with a softer, milder curd with a hint of cheddar bite. They stretched it like mozzarella and sold the hybrid as “cheddarella.” Customers loved it, and people still ask for it, though the family admits they don’t know how to make it again. These days, there are still plenty of cheeses to choose from. In their first year they sold a few hundred pounds per week – now sales reach about 3,000 pounds weekly.

They now make more than 30 styles, from classic cheddars to inventive seasonal wheels, a range that keeps regulars returning to see what’s new.

Shelves hold classics like sharp cheddar, Caralee’s favorite, and inventive wheels rubbed with Tahitian vanilla bean, developed by Heather, which Russ says tastes like ice cream that never melts. Flavored varieties such as mustard herb, lemon sage and Wasatch Back Jack, their first gold-medal winner, rotate through the case. Some wheels age for up to 10 years in the family’s “cheese cave,” with a 15-year release in the works. Rows of shelving hold hundreds of wheels in the chilly room, where the pungent bite of aging cheddar lingers in the damp air.

And with that time has come recognition. Following their first award in 2013, the Kohlers have kept on winning, moving from the Utah Cheese Awards to the American Cheese Awards and on to the World Cheese Awards. In 2022, their Lemon Sage Cheddar won gold at the world level and has placed every year since.

Cheese has secured the farm’s future, giving younger Kohlers the option to carry the tradition forward, something that became even more important after Grant’s passing. Their cheeses continue to win national honors, and regular classes and tasting events extend their outreach. For Russ, the work carries his father’s legacy into the community. “When you lose touch with that,” he said, “you lose part of who you are.”

Heber Valley Artisan Cheese continues to nourish its community with new flavors and long-aged releases. One new offering is Juustoleipa (oo-stay-lee-pa), a Finnish “cheese bread” meant to be fired, grilled or baked. Their products are sold at the flagship store, at farm stands across Utah, and now at Harmon’s and Whole Foods statewide.

As visitors step from the cheese cave back into the sunlight, the green fields and mountain backdrop remind them why the Kohlers fought so hard to stay. For Russ, it’s proof that the farm and the family’s legacy will endure, one wheel of cheese at a time.