Nothing says summertime like a trip to this Cherry Valley business

CHERRY VALLEY — Tom Churchill boiled down the success of his family-owned-and-operated Cattle & Cream store to two words — customer loyalty.

"That's what makes us," he said. "It's the loyalty of the good people of Cherry Valley."

Selling top-shelf cuts of meat, a variety of sure-to-please ice cream flavors, and an assortment of everyday household essentials doesn't hurt either.

Tom, his wife, Barb; son-in-law, Andy Hedlund; and daughter, Samantha Sutkay; and a small core of employees opened the store in the fall of 2019. 

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Churchill has been cutting meat since he was an 18-year-old Kroger grocery store employee in Ottawa, where he grew up. He said the combination of selling meats and ice cream under one roof stems from two passions.

"We've always wanted to do a smaller store that specialized in meat," he said. "And then we fell in love with Cedar Crest ice cream (during family camping trips in Wisconsin where Cedar Crest ice cream is sold throughout the state), and thought, 'You know what? There's no reason we can't add a little ice cream parlor on to the business.'"

It didn't take the Churchills long to see the potential for their business after moving to Cherry Valley seven years ago.

"You've got some nice restaurants down here," he said, "and we thought we could draw people down here with a grocery store. You know? Good meat. Good ice cream."

The idea was simple enough. Purchasing and transforming a dilapidated automotive garage at 105 Cherry St. and turning it into Cattle & Cream took some doing. 

"Andy and I basically built the store with the exception of the electrical," Churchill said. "We did all the construction ... the walls, the floors, concrete cutting, the woodwork. ... We did a lot of the hard dirty work."

Having gone through that experience, Churchill has great appreciation for another family-owned development underway in the village.

Less than a block away at 125 E. State St., Dave and Beth Schroeder are about 16 months into transforming an old industrial building into an upscale retail, office and restaurant venue called The Bricks of Cherry Valley.

Churchill appreciates the development for two reasons.

One, he knows how much sweat equity the Schroeder's have put into the project. And two, "The Bricks," he said, "That's just going to bring more and more people down here."

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Chris Green: 815-987-1241; cgreen@rrstar.com; @chrisfgreen