During college, Ryan bottled beer and mopped the floors at the fledgling New Belgium Brewing Company. After he earned his engineering degree from Colorado State University, he started doing projects for the brewery, from plumbing and wiring to building machines and designing brewery equipment. He learned about the art and science of fermentation, which are valuable skills that he now applies to cheesemaking. He was inspired to make soft-ripened cheese by the Norman Camembert that he shoved in his backpack before heading back from his first trip to France. It was very ripe by the time he got home, and it opened his eyes to the possibility of cheese beyond cheddar.

As a child, Matt would walk to the store down the road from his house just to admire the massive, mouthwatering blocks of cheddar cheese they would display on the counter. It was fond memories like that which helped shape Matt's decision to go into the cheese industry. Matt is the co-founder and marketing & sales director of Mt. Townsend Creamery.