Burglars getting a-whey: Dutch cheese farms increasingly hit in big thefts

Cheese is becoming a hot commodity in the thieving world. Thieves are increasingly targeting cheese shops, where the loot is quite lucrative. “You can easily spend between 100 and 150 euros per whole cheese,” Wim Meure of the Association of Farm Dairy Producers told RTL Nieuws. “It’s been happening more and more in recent years.”

“It is a huge financial drama for cheese farmers,” Meure said. “It will take a year before all customers can be provided with the cheese they want again. For example, an old cheese must be on the shelf for 12 months before it is ready.”

The broadcaster spoke to Martijn van der Valk, whose cheese shop was robbed just before Easter. The thieves took off with over 20,000 euros worth of products. The bakery next door called when they noticed his store had been trashed. He arrived to find everything gone—his entire cheese stock, as well as nuts, sausages, and wine. “I had a whole stock for easter and it was all gone.”

“Easter days are the same as Christmas, which are peaks in terms of turnover. That compensates for the quiet times around the summer. So I have missed out on a lot of important turnover,” Van der Valk told RTL. “Financially, I am on my way to ruin.”

Thieves previously stole 300 cheeses from a cheese farm in Gelderland, and a cheese factory in Fijnaart was targeted twice in one year. Meure thinks the thieves take their loot to Eastern Europe. “All cheeses have a registration number. In the Netherlands, it is easy to trace where the cheese comes from. That does not happen there.”