Cindy and Mike Parker from Caro, Michigan (about 50 miles east of Saginaw) came to our seminar last summer on retailing artisan cheese with a unique plan. For many years, they had been proprietors of a home-improvement center, doing upscale remodels of kitchens, bathrooms and other home projects. They saw a niche in their rural area — their customers were enthusiastic about cooking, and building beautiful kitchens, but the area had nowhere to buy high-end cheeses. The Parkers decided to add a cheese shop to their existing business, and they got it off the ground in July, 2009, barely a month after the June class was over.

Mike and Cindy have kept the focus on artisan cheeses, almost entirely American, and a few crackers. They even buy from two creameries in Michigan, Grassfields near Grand Rapids, and the famed Zingerman’s from Ann Arbor. Zingerman’s Sharon Hollows fresh cow’s milk cheese “flies off the shelves,” reports Cindy. Mike serves it at sampling get-togethers warmed, topped with a marinara sauce.

Artigiano, 3084 W. Gilford Rd., Caro MI 48723. 989-673-8490.

Today’s Oregonian features a great interview with cheesemonger/entrepreneur Steve Jones about his new business, Cheese Bar. I was in the shop the other night, a couple of days after it opened, and the tables and counter spots were full of customers trying the new menu, with neat snacks like brandade.

Steve Jones, the cheesemonger/entrepreneur who teaches our seminar on retailing artisan cheese, will have new tales to tell at this year’s June seminar — he has closed his four-year-old cheese counter in NW Portland, and plans to open a new, larger location in a different part of town in March. Steve — whose generosity and transparency about his business practices make the seminar uniquely valuable — will be able to relate all the details about his change in business model from the tiny but fabulous counter he ran in a wine shop in a busy business district to being on his own in an upscale residential area. Steve is living the dream of curd nerds everywhere. (April 15 is the deadline for discounted tuition at the seminar, limited to 12 participants.)

When the International Association of Culinary Professionals meets in Portland, April 21 – 24, Food by Hand Seminars director Heidi Yorkshire and business consultant/instructor Jackie B. Peterson will be presenting “How to Turn Your Food Passion into a Business” — and the session is now sold out. Heidi and Jackie will show participants a road map to a new business, using the seven key questions every creative entrepreneur needs to answer. “Three hours isn’t long enough to build a business plan, but it’s long enough to map out the direction you’re going,” says Jackie, whose new book, Better, Smarter, Richer: Ten Business Principles for Creative Entrepreneurs is now available at her website.