How one would launder all that cheese? Even say having some big retailer involved, some customers would probably still recognize that the cheese is from that batch.
I imagine it will be smuggled out of the country immediately.
No cheese buyer at a large retailer in the UK would touch it. It’s not worth the risk.
Similarly at the artisan end of the market, it’s a small world (like the article says) - why would you risk your personal and commercial reputation buying stolen goods? You wouldn’t.
I wonder how they are going to smuggle such a gigantic quantity of cheese out of the country. It’s kind of hard to move 22 tonnes of anything without raising suspicion, and doing so in a hurry poses additional challenges.
I’m not disagreeing with you, but 22 tonnes is about 48,000 lbs, which is about the limit (or just over) of what a regular semi trailer can haul (at least in the US). So moving it likely isn’t much issue, but the selling it likely is
There are many places where "this is a highly prized luxury commodity from the West" is more than enough to create a market, and legally lax enough to be minimal risk.
Keep hold of it for a while then when it has blown over sell a truckle here or there to an up-market restaurant, perhaps a few at a time for a small distributor etc.
Probably untraceable and entirely legit looking if you are just selling cheese. It's not like they are going to be trying to off load your "typical" high-value goods at silly low prices in pubs and car boot sales.
Unlike jewels or greenbacks, you can get value out of cheddar over time by eating a cheese heavy diet. I imagine the tough part here is storing that much cheese for long enough to provide a large impact to your monthly grocery budget.
Small corner shops that buys a few legal pieces of cheese through officials channels, but buy the bulk on the black market for a fraction of the price.
