Artisan Cheese Company, the Rosemary District specialty shop known for its carefully sourced cheeses, gourmet sandwiches and convivial classes and tastings, is closing. 

Owner Louise Converse announced the decision Friday in a candid social media post, less than a year and a half after an outpouring of community support helped rescue the business from an earlier planned closure.

 

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by Artisan Cheese Company (@artisancheesecompany)

“In the days and weeks to come you will hear that I am closing the cheese shop,” Converse wrote. “It’s true. I tried unsuccessfully to keep the doors open, but I have failed.”

Converse said sales have fallen 40 percent this year, with an even steeper decline during the summer. She also pointed to debt accumulated while trying to keep the business operating through the Covid pandemic and the difficult years that followed. 

“I got over leveraged with trying to keep the shop open through Covid, and then in the years that followed it all snowballed,” she wrote. “This year we are down 40 percent and the summer has shown us a staggeringly lower percent than that. It’s impossible. I take the blame for not being able to do better.”

The announcement follows a dramatic reprieve in May 2025, when Converse said the shop would close amid inflation, staffing difficulties, reduced customer traffic and lingering hurricane impacts. A GoFundMe campaign raised more than $54,000, and an angel investor also stepped in. Converse reversed the decision and kept the shop open. 

This time, however, the closure is final.

Converse said two employees had hoped to take over the centrally located business but couldn’t assume ownership because the shop was behind on rent. Any potential buyer would also require the landlord’s approval, she wrote.

The shop will begin selling off its cheese inventory and pantry goods on Tuesday, Sept. 15. The announcement didn’t specify a final closing date.

Artisan Cheese Company opened in 2012 in a 1,100-square-foot storefront at 1310 Main St. now occupied by Breaking Wave Coffee. Converse, a Scotland native who had worked at Harvard University, founded the business after traveling through England, Scotland and New England with her husband, Parker, studying the culture and craft of cheesemongering. An early review praised the shop’s cheeses from small dairy producers, grilled cheese sandwiches and European-style breakfasts of cheese, sliced baguette and jam. The menu also included mac and cheese, bread pudding and freshly baked scones, while its shelves carried a compact selection of chutneys, preserves and other pantry goods.

In 2018, Converse moved to a 3,000-square-foot space at 550 Central Ave. in the Rosemary District. A Kickstarter campaign raised $48,624 for the expansion and the creation of an apprentice kitchen. The shop later partnered with Girls Inc. of Sarasota County on a paid culinary apprenticeship for high school students, which ran for about 18 months before the pandemic interrupted it.

Over the years, the shop grew into more than a place to purchase wedges from its rotating selection of roughly 80 cheeses. It became known for classes, tastings, lunches, natural wine, craft beer and the kind of conversation that made lingering at the counter part of the experience.

“The cheese industry is incredible,” Converse wrote in the closure announcement. “I wish I could have stuck it out. I love all of it. I have been so proud to be part of it. I have let you down. I am so sorry. I mean it.”

She encouraged customers to continue supporting independent cheese shops and other locally owned businesses.

“Please go and shop at your local shops,” she wrote. “You have no idea what they are going through behind the shiny facade of social media.”

Converse ended by thanking the customers who sustained Artisan Cheese Company for more than 14 years.

“You’re the reason why we have been here for 14.5 years,” she wrote. “You’re truly the most lovely.”