When we launched Wheycation, we asked ourselves a lot of questions: Why don't we, as a cheese-making country, make better use of the whey produced during cheese production? Why doesn't the protein in so many functional products come from Switzerland? And why is it often not even clear where the protein comes from?
The answers to these questions aren't easy to find. After more than six years of intensive research into the topic of whey, we've gained a wealth of insight. With Wheycation, we aim to make a significant contribution to improving the use of whey and increasing transparency regarding the origin of proteins in functional products.
The mission Our company's mission is therefore to upcycle side streams from the food industry, with a focus on whey, into high-quality food products. Upcycling, a compound word from "up" and "cycle," means in the food industry that a raw material not previously used for human consumption is upgraded and returned to the food cycle.
Because so much cheese is produced in Switzerland, a lot of whey is also produced: around 1.3 million tons annually! This often ends up in animal feed or biogas plants, even though it contains valuable protein for human consumption. This is often not exclusively, but often, due to economic reasons. There are no high-quality applications for the whey to make further processing worthwhile.
This is where we come in: We develop high-quality, functional products based on whey and create a new market for Swiss whey.
For about two years we have been working with HOCHDORF Swiss Nutrition AG upcycling whey from Swiss cheese production to produce protein for our high-quality recovery protein shakes and protein porridges.
For Switzerland Cheese Marketing AG, this was an opportunity for an exciting portrait. One day in February, a team from KARGO Kommunikation GmbH visited in Sulgen, took pictures of the various process stages and interviewed those responsible for development and production – including at the Hochdorf partner and whey supplier Strähl Cheese AG .
You can see how the protein is produced and where it comes from in the video created by KARGO.
Split: