Emilia: Celebrated Cheesemonger Leading with Italian

Meet Emilia—a Sales & Marketing Manager in the Cheese/Packaging industry who recently earned the title of 2025 Meilleure Fromagère du Monde.

During the Mondial du Fromage (World Cheesemonger Olympics) in France, much of my work was influenced by my Italian heritage and knowledge of Italian cuisine and culture.

Languages: English (fluent), Italian (proficient), French (intermediate)

Grew Up in: North Haven, CT

University: Italian major & French minor at Montclair State University (NJ)

Did internships and/or study abroad programs enrich your language journey as a student or recent grad? What would you say has been your greatest takeaway from these experiences?

As a language major, my study abroad experiences in Sicily and Florence, Italy, were crucial to my success because of the immersion aspect—being able to apply in real life the concepts that I had learned in the classroom allowed me to increase my understanding of the language and culture, and become not only a better speaker of the language, but a more well-rounded global citizen.

Interacting with locals in the target language provided insight and practice that can only come from real-world situations. Going beyond the classroom allowed me to take the extra step and feel more comfortable in my speaking abilities and conversational skills.

My greatest takeaway is that you reap what you sow: If you put minimal effort into learning and practicing the language, you will see minimal improvement. If you work hard and take every opportunity to practice or learn something new, your skills will improve more steadily and quickly.

How have your language and cultural skills supported and/or enhanced your professional opportunities?

Speaking more than one language is a huge benefit when working in the cheese industry. It expands your professional network significantly and allows you to communicate with people from different countries and different parts of the industry—cheesemakers, distributors, importers, affineurs, even other mongers!

Being able to talk with them and understand their experience ultimately makes you a more well-rounded cheese professional and deepens your knowledge of the products.

My favorite example of this is when I visited a Swiss cheesemaker, but our translator had a work emergency and wasn’t able to stay for the whole morning. While I don’t speak German and my French is weak at the moment, we figured out that the cheesemaker actually spoke Italian, and we were able to spend an entire morning learning about Gruyère cheesemaking and aging exclusively in Italian! The experience taught me a few new technical cheesemaking terms in Italian, but it also created a new friendship between me, my partner, and the cheesemaker, who we are still in contact with years later.

What advice would you share with current language learners or those considering studying a language?

Don’t stop practicing. It’s like a muscle: you need to stretch it. Read books in the target language, find people to have conversations with, watch your favorite shows with subtitles on. Any small way that you can incorporate your target language into your every day life will benefit you and keep your skills up-to-date.

It’s often said that English is the language of global business, and because of that, language skills aren’t necessary to succeed. Do you agree or disagree? Why?

I both agree and disagree. There is a degree of truth to the statement; however, it’s important to realize that many things get lost in translation. The true meaning and intention of someone’s words may not be understood if translated directly, and in my opinion, your ability to truly connect with other people is limited. There is no robot that can replace the value of the human connection, in business or otherwise.

Do you have an interesting, moving, or humorous anecdote featuring your language or cultural skills to share?

During the Mondial du Fromage (World Cheesemonger Olympics) in France, much of my work was influenced by my Italian heritage and knowledge of Italian cuisine and culture. I even introduced myself in Italian during my oral presentation and sprinkled in a few key words and terms. I chit-chatted with the Italian competitors during breaks.

After the competition, someone came up to me to let me know that my “English was very good!” as they were under the impression (because of my work and my name) that I was an Italian cheesemonger competing for the USA. I told her, "Thank you, I’ve been practicing my English for 32 years!"

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