E512 From 35 Cows to a WDE Grand Champion: 4 Breeders Using Sales, Embryos & Presentation to Make Registered Holsteins Pay

0:00Music So nice, creeping across the pass So land got dirt on the boots And a working head From the milkhouse home To the oxygen cove These are the folks standing strong in tall Yeah, this is the full line Coming on the air Sharing the stories of the folks who care Profiles of passion, voices of the trade Terry Strong legends being made Yeah, this is the full line Coming on the air Sharing the stories of the folks who care Profiles of passion, voices of the trade

1:00Welcome to the Bullvine podcast Where we cut through the milk check noise To what actually pays on registered dairy farms Today's episode is something special The complete audio from the Pennsylvania Holstein Association's Market like a pro panel at their recent convention Huge thanks to PHA for hosting this livestream session They're doing great work supporting Holstein breeders across the state Moderated by cattle sales veteran Chris Hill of MD Hill Brook Sales You'll hear straight talk from four powerhouse marketers Jenny Thomas of Triple T Holsteens in Ohio The 35 cow operation that's boarding show strings and running sales Betsy Bullard of Bragging Farms in Maine 10th generation with nearly 600 cows And Holstein Association members since 1943 Alicia Lamb of Oakfield Corners Dairy in New York The 11,000 cow team flushing 8,000 embryos a year while making artisanal cheese

2:00Peter Dupingyser of Ransom Rail Farm in New York Now ST Genetics Eastern US Sales Manager with partnerships keeping him in more registered cows than ever They tackle the real questions And sign our expectations, selling your best calf, adapting to cow buyer and COVID And how to turn registration papers into revenue when milks at $16.65 Stick around, this is gold for anyone with registered Holsteens From 35 head family ops to 11,000 cow teams Let's jump in The Pennsylvania Holstein people were so glad that you are able to join us here For our marketing like a pro panel discussion All these fine folks that agree to come and enlighten you on how aggressively market cow But we're so glad they're here representing Well, I guess we got two New Yorkers of Maine and Ohio and Marylanders So they're going to educate us a little bit here

3:00But we've got some questions to go through that we already sort of prepared But then it's going to be plenty of time for you to ask questions So Flash, I'll turn it over to you And later we're going to have a really cool sale sale Stick around for that Yeah, that's my speed So if I funnel here a little bit, don't get upset with Maine folks First of all, I'd like to commend PHA and David for putting on this This little round table of marketing and merchandising And I think we have not only four very, very knowledgeable couples And slash people, but only one of them has come up here with I understand some of the guys haven't stayed home because of the weather But just natural and you've got to run a big period and you have to do it But it is an honor and a privilege to be up here with these people I'm not only knowing them for most of my life I've worked for each and any Every one of them in some aspect or another So well, before we start, let me close I'd like you to give these folks around the call If they're taking time to come and share

4:01They're debating to the law When David first asked me to do this I was a little bit hesitant because public speaking is really not my thing Unless it involves numbers that go on really fast So it is an honor and a privilege And most of you know me, my name is Chris Hill from MD Hill book sales And my wife Jen and I have a small select group of efforts We buy, we sell, we buy private, we buy public We sell semen for blonde and my wife is very involved in her home farm In which we raise efforts now They did sell their cows And we have several efforts there for Jobo, Joy and her family That we raise for them and that's going really good And most of all my life, the best thing I have My wife and my in-laws who do a lot for me And I'm just very, very appreciative for all they do So with that said, going from this side to the other

5:02From Dr. T. Holosteen's in North Lear It's far better than Ohio, we have this Jenny Thomas She'll be with us, they're involved in millions and millions of different avenues of marketing Different breeds, Jenny's a photographer That's a great job of civil, picture photography I think that's getting less day by day But she still takes beautiful pictures They're very, very involved with their children They have three wonderful children So I know you've seen it to shows but not only at home They're very, very involved with sports And very good at what they do But yeah, they have time to do chores and have family time and do very well Next up is Mr. Betsy Bullard from Turner Maine Back when I was a fitter I used to go work the mainstays sale and they were sponsored Every year, since that time They've added a lot of cows, they've gotten big I think they have more mouths to feed now And her and her husband do a wonderful job managing bringing farms And they have avenues off the farm as well

6:04Have kids that are very, very interested And next in line is Mrs. Alicia Lamb Our Jonathan Manage, along with other family members His brother and another partner Oville Corners dairy And if it's got something to do with dairy and beef Cheese, wagyu, they do it Basically they do it all, they do a darn good job of it They have that sale coming up And to which it's just a short time away And we appreciate Alicia being here again She has her son with her, she has a son and a daughter They have many children running around there Be it from current jobs or other members of the family That are very interested in showing and doing a very good job They have to do the guys The load man with me up here So Pete is here with his wife, Fox Anne From ransom rail farm And parent of your Pete and his wife and boys They did sell out several years ago

7:05But they're still very active in the dairy industry They spent a short time in Wisconsin Now they're back in Western New York They're so dear, I don't believe it's back in Western New York And Jane gets down there like this Her family pets pay and he'll tell you a little bit about them later So before we go any further on I'm going to have each and one of them We're going to have several steps of this conversation I'm going to go to each and every one They're going to explain a little bit about what they do How they do and what aspects of the dairy business that they're in And then we're going to go to step number two I have several questions They're going to ask and they're going to answer to the best of their ability And then I'll conclude with my portion of it to a question That has something to do with each and every one of them Smarketing program And then we'll take the questions for Facebook Live and from the crowd So when they're going to do this Ms. Jenny Thomas She's going to tell you about a little bit about Triple T Gold students Thank you, Jenny, go ahead

8:06Well, Triple T Gold students is our family dairy farm in North Louisburg, Ohio My husband, his brother and his father They found in the farm themselves It's for coming up on 20 years of milking their in North Louisburg It wasn't an existing dairy farm They pretty much bought a milking cows with a bucket milker And a heifer barn with sour heifer barn But decided they wanted to expand and build And went to an auction bought a standing building for $3,000 We moved to North Louisburg and put it up And it was a weekend project to get that thing going So to say it was started to scratch That is for sure one of those things As time's gone on, we keep trying to continue to build more buildings And make it more, I guess, our home mode is today But it all started with what we call kind of a 4-H project on the straight And so it's kind of spiraled out of control from there Right now we're milking about 35 head of registered pool scenes jerseys

9:07We do board the Vieira show string at our farm as well And that's become a really nice partnership that we have with them We've always, that's how many things kind of got started I guess I'll speak on his behalf But he started selling cattle when he was a fitter He would try to find one kind of a diamond in the rough thing And polish it and try to resell And it was just that slowly, you know, making $1,000 here, $2,000 there What evolved and kind of grew into where he is today And what the farm is today We were a little kind of afford to buy a couple cornerstones Like the damma page that's put us on the map And that's kind of where that came from As things kind of went on and we continue to develop in milk cows And the page family started doing a lot of great things for us Our good friend, Michael Heath We decided to have a start sale and do a sale with him And that was the first triple tea and best triple tea and need sale that we had

10:07And that turned into a series And then we kind of just had an annual sale We managed a couple of sales for some friends But then after that, after we lost my gold We wanted to continue doing it We felt there was a need for it And especially in the jersey grid and the whole steam side as well So we continued on and kind of evolved to the Thomas marketing and consulting And managing the sales Like the amplifier sale at the air dairy And working with air and eating it out of New York to do the spring select sale for our second year And then continued on our triple tea sale as well So there's been lots of different avenues and things that have kind of evolved over the last 20 years But it's definitely been a team effort on everybody's behalf Not only just Nathan and mine, but also our family Thank you, Jenny Moving on to passing All right, I guess it's my turn now So breed farms is located in Turner, Maine Which is sort of our firm here

11:08And everything else as it turns out The farm's been in existence since 1777 So my husband Bill and I are the 10th generation to farm there He's not for a farm, which is great It's like hyperbigger for our kids So if you've met either of them That will make lots of sense Bringing farms has been a member of the Holstein Association U.S.A. for 83 years So, you know, there's a talk about genetics There's definitely a genetic component to our business Like the, I don't know, my grandfather loved registered Holstein He's got into registered Holstein's, my parents continued that My dad spent some time as a fitter as well I was reading one of Ron Hughes's books the other day He had interviews that Doug Blair did with some folks like Old Lindsay And there's one with Dave Younger, which was fascinating and amusing And he talked about seed breaks and his fluffy clipping on the animals

12:11And the sale they did to kiddos for him So that was kind of the world that I was immersed in growing up Our farm has changed over time They were milking about 60 when my husband and I moved up in 2000 We're milking, you know, to shy us 600 mature cows right now But cow families and investing in great cow families, great maternal lines And then it turning around and figuring out what we do with them So that's been a fun process that has certainly evolved over time So we'll enjoy chatting about that as we go Thank you very much Now to Alicia Hi everyone, first of all thanks for including me in this panel I think it's going to be a fun discussion here I'm Alicia Lam, my husband is John at the lab The lab family has been involved in agriculture since they I guess immigrated from England back in the 1600s or 1500s whenever it was So Jonathan and his brother are 12 generation farmers here in the United States

13:15Which is pretty incredible And something that the lab family is very proud of They moved from where they landed and asked to choose this Out to Western New York in the 1800s I can't remember the exact year And I've been farming in the Sanctuary just in New York since that time So over the years they had very memorable beginnings Jonathan's dad and grandfather walking about 50 cows When the state of New York threw them in a domain came through to purchase their property So they had to move, that's now a state park They had to move to where the farm is located now in 1965 Which is an old field in New York And it actually from the stories I've heard has been a great thing Because the land is so much better in old field than where they were previously So it was a great thing They've expanded a lot since the mid 60s When Jonathan came back to the farm after college That was back in 1997, 1997, early 1998

14:19Late 1996, 1997, sorry We get back to the farm full time And a lot of expansion occurred since that time So we're currently building up four locations Three in Western New York And one in Western Ohio It's about 11,000 loving cows total Obviously with that many cows There's a lot of people in fall And we really look at ourselves as a team So we're fortunate to have a lot of great people that we work with As far as our genetics program When I moved from Florida originally And I met this handsome young man when I was in college And had these romantic visions of cows in New York And for some crazy reason I think my life said there was snow and stuff like that Mom, I'm going to have a extremely hard this year I've been on him many years of getting into New York But yeah, so I moved to New York And back in late 90s, we started off our genetics program Back in those days, embryo transfer was kind of still in its infancy

15:23I would say And you could buy embryos from like the best show cows in the world for like 250 bucks And that was pretty cheap And the one thing we were really good at was making pregnancies And making fast So that's really how we got our start with our genetics program We would buy like dye, you know And raise from daughters of black rows and delegates at the time For next to nothing And we could get three or four upper calves from those cows And we had a business go on We could resell those calves to four aged kids To other breeders And that's really how we got our start with this And genomics did And so Jonathan's dad always had an interest in index cows And we really believed in the science behind genomics And started into that pretty heavy as well So currently We blush mostly internally through transova And I should say completely internally through transova and morbid type And transfer about 8,000 embryos a year

16:23Through those programs About 95% of those embryos are indexed So high GTPI I find that Mary cows were looking to make the next grateful The next great deal of grateful And then about four to five percent of that From a showtime cow Showtime embryos I should say And then we do a view of beef as well Some swimming is and I'll walk you About a year and a half, two years ago We started our O-Field Artisanal business Just looking for ways to diversify I'm insane And what better way to do that than to make product on the farm Right? I don't know I'm sure a lot of you are doing that on the farm And holy cow, that's a little different industry And it's been a very steep learning curve for us But it's been a lot of fun So we make Mexican style artisanal cheeses We make three of them now We just started up a fourth venue Which, given the super excited about Making some cheese curds, flavor cheese curds With our next kind of cheese So Anyhow, that's kind of my story

17:23We do have a sale coming up We're going to talk about marketing We'll get into that more and more But thank you again for having me I really appreciate it Thank you for having me I appreciate it And I'm really looking forward to a good discussion So I'm kind of the odd guy here For probably more than one reason But for You know, we don't have a dairy anymore We six, seven years ago We sold our dairy And moved to Wisconsin Both of our sons were working out there Managing large carries And so we moved out there And I took a job at that time And then we moved back About a year and a half ago Now I managed that The East U.S. sales team for us Teach genetics working And primarily mission Indian And Wisconsin with larger dairies And then from there Move to a East Central U.S. sales manager position And then when we move back

18:23About a year and a half ago Now I managed that the East U.S. sales team For us teach genetics So we were just able to Stay in the business because we have Six or eight partners And we're probably working with more cattle And we're working with On the registered side I'm not going to say how many Because my wife is sitting in the ground So I don't really wonder at all exactly But on She did see the scrunchy once And she said I was not We were downsizing And it's sex seeming How to happen but we're super Blast to work with fantastic people And I have to mention No source they They're the ones we work with Predominantly on our best showtime cattle And just fantastic partners And we love doing that But we have, you know, We have a couple of different partners And Pennsylvania and several in New York And a couple more even in Wisconsin yet So it allows us to do

19:23What we do and We all believe it needs to be a win-win And as long as you have that The partnership works out very well And it's allowed my son tonight To continue in this business doing what we love Thank you, Pete If you want to pass the mic Right back up to Ms. Jennings She's going to be the first one every time So everybody has to follow the Jennings for its best Now we're going to do, I have six questions here We're going to ask each and every Lot of you to answer that In a short but very informative Answer, and the first question is For you, Jennings What is the main approach to marketing Your type of cattle And what outlets do you use, etc? Like I would say Time show Whatever's remind into the industry I would say obviously I probably sell Through myself But I'm not limited to selling them Through other sales management firms We all get along, we're all one family We've got to work together In order for this thing to go right

20:23So, Jennings, here you go again What is your main approach to marketing Your type of cattle and what outlets do you use? Obviously I'm worried to the show industry We're worried to the show type cattle But I also love good pedigrees Good cow families And I think it all translates But I think I said before We began the triple tea And heat sale We evolved that We tried to consign a bulk of our Stock and young cows And top consignments to our own sales But we also find a lot of value And marketing throughout the country And all the top sales I think you have to spread it around Getting different markets And like Chris said You have to all be friends And we all have to work together We can sign in the sale tonight We can sign to Chris's sales We can sign out to sales all over Young group sales The PA I can't say I'm out of my safe band But the heat sale there

21:23Stake cops Stake cops I know It was a struggle in there But yes, we try to And on all different levels And I think that we try to Send our best to what we have To fit those different sales And those different platforms Yeah I don't know if they post you. Why am I not going to struggle with any college needs? You should have been like that, I was trying to buy a scooter or buy a kid. So for us, it's been sort of interesting as we've grown to her over the last 25 years. I think kind of the number of animals we've been marketing has shifted over time. We have hosted several sales at the farm, both kind of earlier on when we moved up there and away in 2010-2024, we hosted another sale and our goals are always to sell those deep maternal lines of them. It's really a feeling of animals that we don't want to work in any sort of operation.

22:24So that's really been our focus, whether we're calling them cross-over cattle or certainly that they're current genetics, they're productive genetics, but that's certainly what we strive to do. I think over time, as we kind of, I don't know if it's a plateau, one count of hers, but maybe plateau, but for beans not a weight anywhere else that I mentioned that earlier. So we have to get a little bit more creative, certainly we have something in the sale here tonight and we are always cognizant of selling those best ones, looking for the best opportunities to maximize that value to us and making sure that we're selling cattle that are going to be successful for somebody else. I mean, there's nothing cooler than getting that message that A, this one that we bought as a calf is very better than our, you know, just one ex-loaners, we've got three daughters, we could be happier with them. So at the end of the day, that's certainly what we strive to do.

23:24What we're going to rate it again, lashing it. You got it. I think I got it. So with our marketing program, we have two distinct divisions, the next side and the share of something. So I'll start with our index side. It used to be pretty easy to move some index cows, especially when genomics head and mother's migrahi, you could sell and make some really good money from those index cows. It's not so easy anymore. There's a lot of restrictions from stunts out there, so our marketing primarily on our index cattle, it's bulls going to stop, but that's about it. We are able to sell some idea of sessions from time to time. We do a few privately, we've done a few in sales, not too many because of the on-term restrictions. So that's where we are with our index animals. It's still obviously a large portion of what we do and it is still financially successful. It's just different than it used to be, maybe not quite as fun as it used to be back

24:26on the day, but it is one of its. For the type side, things are pretty wide open, how we're able to market those animals. We do a lot privately, we sell a lot of sales and we have our own sale. We try to, like Jenny said, make sure they're putting the right type of animals in the right type of sales, be it a college sale, be it a Pennsylvania Holstein sale, or be it like a national convention type of sale, we try to match those cattle to those markets. But yeah, it's a lot of fun selling on type cattle. We have a lot of fun making embryos and trying to make that next best or great show cow or rude cow for someone. The embryo market is pretty strong right now. Chris and Tim have set up bright future sales and in those embryos, we're able to sell those very successfully and those types of sales. So lots of opportunity for those types of animals and we're appreciative of those markets. Yeah, so when we had our dairy, we were very involved in the index side of things as well.

25:28But when you don't have resips, that gets to be the tougher situation. So we've kind of moved away from that and we're more exclusively in the type side of things. And again, when our partners, we were looking to fit the right cattle to the right sale. Well, like everybody else said, we want to sell our best, we want cattle to go on and do very well for people. And I remember when my boys were young, Jared, he was the younger son, he was probably eight or nine and we had four sisters to roll their camera. And somebody came in and we had sold them a pick of one of those and four calves were there and he said to me, he said, they're going to pick the best one. And I said, well, but they don't want your sick cat. They want your best one, right? And so that kind of stopped with them, right? You have to sell your best, you have to sell what people want and holding on and doing

26:29very well. We use some of our social media, not as well as we should, but that's kind of our outlet. But we're looking to sales all over the country and see where cattle are going to fit best and do well. Okay, back to question number two for the panel. As a consider to an auction, what do you expect from the sale manager and number two? What can you as a consider do to ensure your animal sales for a market value or offer? What do you as a consider expect from the manager for your commission pay and what can you do to ensure your animal brings what it should? The tricky question is that I see it for both sides here. But as a consider, you definitely want the sale management to give your animal or your consignment the exposure it deserves and to relay that to the potential customer as clearly

27:31and consensually and as honestly as possible. As a consider yourself, I think you need to also assist with that. I mean, we all are on social media, most of us are probably on social media. And I think there is probably an algorithm so you don't maybe see things as much as what you used to and there's certain words you have to try to stay away from so that you don't get lost in a feed and things like that. But the more times that you can share or create your own posts to, I guess, help the sale management get your animal out there, I think that's a good thing. I think you need to take responsibility on your own to also market your animal and get it down there to the public, whether that be a print ad, whether that be a social media post, there's a lot of your avenues that you can do. Sale management always tries to have X amount of lots in the sale and you're trying to do the same job for all of your considers. So I understand that and you want to get everybody out there. But I think as a consider, if you can step up and do a little extra, that's not only

28:35help you yet. Perfect. Yeah, Rudeco, I would echo all of that. I mean, certainly expectations for sale management, I mean, you're relying on their expertise to have created an event that buyers are aware that it's happening and that they're looking forward to it and they're looking forward to whoever to killer segment of cattle, particular quality of cattle and so as it inside, if you're relying on that, you're relying on them to make sure that they're presenting information in an accurate manner and then certainly an easy to consume manner that you don't have to wait through 82 pages, though, she's not even knowing that other record was a thing or not. So that would be my expectations for sale management and really you have a lot of responsibilities as a consider. I mean, if you are consistently sending cattle to a sale that haven't seen a halter before or haven't ever seen water before, fitting crews remember that, sale managers remember that and it's really important.

29:37It's really important that you do your part, I mean, that they're well grown and they're healthy, that they're, and you've done everything you can do to build up pedigree to the point where it's appealing to a buyer. If you haven't done that work, then it's really hard for the sales managers to do their work. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. Then I have a whole lot to add to what Betsy Jennings said really. One thing we try to do is take nice pictures and honestly sell bones nowadays, take really good pictures and video. And so I try to do that as much as I can, you know, get the balls off of them, clean them up a little bit just so they're not nasty, look at, make them look presentable. But, you know, doing a lot of that wouldn't on social media is a great thing. So Jamie, the manager of their show is cheering and he does a lot of staff chat, he'll direct us such a few people that he knows might have interest in certain animals. So anything that you can do as a designer to promote yourself, promote your animals that are selling us, that's the best way to do it, I think, as much as we love our

30:39sale managers, Crescent Town, they're wonderful. But anything that you can do really, it's gonna push that to get the extra few hundred thousand dollars that you really want when you're selling your animals. Yeah, everybody's done great job, really laying out what's important on both sides. I said, the only other thing I would say is that we wouldn't ask from a sales manager to just help us decide what's the right fit for the sale, right? They understand the sale, how it's gonna flow, what the cost of our base is gonna be. And so helping us choose the right animal for that sale, we really rely on the sales management for that. And then, whatever one else has said, it's your animal, it's your responsibility to get her looking the best that she can or present them the best way you can. So we take that very seriously when we look at something and we want them to be successful. So that's on us. Thanks, Beaton. And I think echoing from that, as far as what you expect from the sale manager, I think number one, the sale manager is probably the person that drove in your driveway and selected

31:43that animal. And that's true. What we have all experience is you have to do some work at all, too. They need to be ultra broke and either if they come in there with skis per feet, they're like, it's gonna see the good parts. They're gonna see the bad foot. You see her feet? You see her feet? Oh, yeah. That's all you're gonna hear. She can be a great, great animal. Hey, that's that. But, you know what? Everybody's gonna turn to the negative because it's human intuition. So, and I also say, I'll sell manager, you know, we all dig into another question. What do you do for your commission? What do you do for your commission? Well, commission's same as it was in 1984 and animals bring the second price they did or less than in 1984. And I think we all know the cost of living, the cost of everything is going up. So, we don't have these good-time and sales to get rich. We do it number one to market our own cattle. And number two is to try and help all the breeders as much as we can.

32:43Coming to our next question, there's probably folks listening, there's folks in this room and forum listening to the forum have never come signed to a sale or advertising their farm and any sort of that. We all know that we're good friends with a lot of them. What advice would you give to them to start out on a merchandising if you have registered whole schemes? Why not take advantage of this? Because obviously we know the meltchicks right now eat real good. What are we going to do to make money off the farm? Because we have registered papers. Let's use them to our advantage. Jane? That's a good point. I think a lot of people that haven't consigned for whatever reason it is. Sometimes they're not willing to give their best animal to the people out on the driveway and ask for the best animal. Whether that's a fear that they will bring enough or the fear that they won't be able to make another one. I don't know what that is, 100%. But I know there's a lot of really good breeders out there that just won't sell.

33:45And for whatever reason it is. But if you're looking to make the extra money, if you put in a good animal to a sale, it's going to bring a good price. There's enough great cow people out there that appreciate good pedigrees and good type, good in-depth, whatever. And it might be they find value with that. So I think for me, one of the things for people to get extra money, be open-minded and willing to trust a sale manager or whoever to consign your best animal off the farm. Thanks. If all I go get it now, I'm not trying to take over trust with me. But call us. Nice to see you. Email us. If we haven't been to your fund, we'd love to come. But we've got to know you're interested. Betsy? Yeah, I would echo that. Just take the jump and consign your best. And they're worth what the market says. They're worth, I mean, it's sorely classified. We can imagine that they're all 89.2-year-olds.

34:46But until somebody unbiased comes in and tells us, okay, this is where they fit. I'll continue on my things. That's eye-opening and take that and learn from them. Maybe your best is at the E6 point effort. It's still fantastic. But it can be overwhelming to try to figure out where you fit. And then continue on my things. And if you haven't been consigning, you haven't been doing that. Check out some sales that you enjoy. Or you felt like, geez, where did that go on the top of that sale? What did they do that I'm not doing? What am I doing? They're not doing. Why didn't I get signed on top of that sale? And just kind of have those conversations, maybe. So a couple of thoughts with this. And maybe I should imagine that with the... What does the sale manager do? Question. But one thing you can do when you're considering signing to a sale is ask the sale manager. Ask Chris. What do you think this animal is worth?

35:47Because if he says, yeah, it's worth about $2500. And you're expecting $5,000. There's a significant difference there. And you either brace yourself for that or just say no. Or, you know. And we... Yeah, I'd much rather be the bad guy up front than Adrian was going. Yeah, and that's, you know, something that you've done a lot when you consider it. You're just putting it into your own sale. What is the market value of that animal? So that's something that Chris and whoever you're selling your is has great expertise out that I don't necessarily have. The other part of that when we're marketing animals, especially if you are new to marketing, kind of to the industry if you want to call it or sales this, you have to market yourself a little bit too. And that's one thing that we've worked hard at both Goop and Mortars is to build a brand. If you want to call it that, tell your story, tell, you know, hey, we're 12 generations of farmers.

36:48We're big. And that's not always a positive. We're big. But we also love cows. And just tell your story. I remember. So the very first cow John that I bought when we moved up here was just in a local baby alley, Stephen County, say home to your, you know, we spent like three grand on our baby. But it was the first cow that we bought together. And so there's a story there. We still have members here in that cow family that have done well. We've had, you know, at least 15 excellent animals from my cow family. They're still moving in the far in the commercial operations. So much. And just telling those stories of some of those cows that you are going to sell and telling that story of you as the farm and as a breeder. I think that resonates with buyers. And it makes people respect you as a breeder and as someone you saw. Yeah, I think to add a little bit to our Alicia said is, you know, working with a sale manager.

37:48But there's, you know, working with smart people that are marketing up here for your neighbors who are marketing and get advice from that. How are you doing this? How do you market yourself? Well, what fits into this sale? And then, you know, be willing to let your basketball and have realistic expectations. I think that's really important. Really, be sure that you know, hey, this, this animal's got a fit in this range. And there are tons of markets, right? You know, there are so many markets that you can fit into. What do you have that fits into that type of market? So, you know, and if that's something that you want to develop, talk to people. How do you, how do you get into this show stuff? How do you, how do you get into that market? Or whether it's pulled or rather, whatever it is, understand what you have and where they fit and talk to other people who are good marketers on how to get it done and be happy when you do it? Hit the nail on the head.

38:48And that's where all those four very valuable answers to the question. Now, we're going to get into some really deep questions. I think next one is such COVID and the inception of Calvire sales of change. We all know that. How is your merchandising program benefacted by these changes? And what do you do to adapt? For example, when COVID hit, my life was turned upside down. We had cattle at Frederick for a large band of sale. They were already fairground. They were already tied up. And the world stopped. I didn't know what to do. They said, they're going to take tractor trailers off the road. I didn't, I was going to have 80 handed to Frederick Fairgrounds for six months. So, obviously we had to adapt. So, we did for that. And then, once that was over, we got all the cattle going. Everybody, it was a very successful sale. Then, I wonder what am I going to do now?

39:48I can't be an ox mirror because it can't be anybody to sale. So, that's when we bought in. I had the idea of this bright future sale where people commercialized embryos, which it takes six people, three people and somebody from Calvire there to help us out. I was working in a still one. There's one Monday night. But, I'm not doing this. It's an after me. I'm telling you what I did to get through COVID. And it took a hold. And, if I've even worn since five embryos out of a certain cow, we sell them that nine times out of ten. Another interested party is going to call them. In the next few days, and you can end up in cell 15 or 20, embryos, you're not paying a commission on them. So, that's kind of my story, Jenny. There's COVID in us all. Oh, yeah. To go back to the last question, really quick, though, something I thought of after we kind of got through this. If you're thinking about selling and you're afraid to send that great wine, I mean, your prefix carries on. And that's something to be very proud of. I'm pretty sure Alicia's got a Calvire thing full loose

40:48that they've read that they no longer own, and then still puts that on the map. So, not to regress here, but it just wanted to touch on that as well. Your prefix stays on that animal forever. And that's no better way, like, like, Dundee Page put us on the map. No better way to build your brand than to have a family do well for other people. And life is about a brand. That's right. So, back to COVID, I like to forget about it all together. But I guess we were lucky in Ohio, for instance, that we were able to maybe carry on with life a little bit more normally than some other states. And I won't mention any other state names. But we were able to do some things and move a little more freely than maybe some other states were able to do. So, we tried to move forward as business as usual as much as we possibly could, whether it be having sales shows, whatever. The reason I bring up the show and ask back to us is because that carries over into the marketing of brand,

41:51your sales, everything that we do as registered breeders. And that year with no Madison, that hit a lot of us really hard. We, I know there are several people in here and some people on the stage that came together and we put on a show that tried to replace expose for that year. And we said we found value in carrying on and having all American contests and doing all these things and having recognition because you lose a year. At that time, we didn't know how many years we were going to do this. We felt like we had to carry that on to keep the registered business and what we grew through living alive and well. So, that was one of the things that we decided was really important to us. Again, we tried to have sales as normal as possibly we could. Obviously, we all have to do the lovely, earthquake testing and things like that now that hasn't gone away. But, you know, when that first came out, we thought that was going to be the end of the world.

42:52And we've all kind of moved on from there. But Cowbuyer has been a great tool. But, everybody knows we're technology. You have problems sometimes. And we've been all into sales, whether it's been some sort of glitch or this or that at no fault to anybody. But, that's just technology. I think still having a value of sales staff and people there and trusting people that are at sales, maybe so-called the old-fashioned way, is very, very important. You've got to have the eyeballs there at the sale that people are going to trust if those people can't be there themselves. Thanks. So, there's a lot between COVID and Cowbuyer and when we think of what sales look like today or what they looked like 20 or 25 years ago, I mean, for us up in New England, COVID restrictions kind of drove the need for another show. Again, some of our usual suspects were a thing. So, we had a fall show that's forced to do a really successful spring show series.

43:53So, I mean, I think all of us are determined to continue moving the business forward and to be creative and in problem solving. So, I think that speaks to the resilience of our readers and marketers around them countries. So, that's pretty exciting. And the Cowbuyer has been a fantastic tool. I think it changes the vibe of a sale. When you're not thinking cheese, there's not 350 people sitting down here in the audience. We're not going to have a sale. So, that's pretty different. But that goes back to one of the earlier questions about what your responsibility as a designer. You better have done your work at home and figure out how to use social media. I mean, there's obviously that's a whole other conversation about whether they're not great things about social media. But, you know, when I think of what we do, we certainly try to utilize social media. I feel like, so you know, okay, you all have some, whether it's your cell phone company or your credit card company, where there's like that two-step authentication

44:53or something else. But I feel like I have that social media now because I have a 19-year-old daughter who assists on some of the farm toes. So, I'll post things and then she'll help me improve them. So, to speak, which is great. But, you know what I mean? And I think that's in the same vein and it's just asking people questions. Don't be shy. Don't invite, like, one person out of a million is going to be unpleasant. If you ask a question, but the vast majority of people are happy to answer your questions or whether it's a sale manager or whether it's somebody that you admire that's done a lot of marketing work or is it terrific breeder? I mean, we wouldn't do any of this stuff if we didn't love it. And we'd love to talk about it too. So, ask questions and listen to the answers too. That's an important step. So, the old days of having sales was a lot of fun. You know, we have big 10. Bring out the animals. You want them to go to the ring and Rama was our auctioneer

45:54and if anybody turned Rama, he gets pretty animated. And actually, I saw him a couple of weeks ago at the New York Woolsey Convention. He's like, oh my gosh, that last live sale we have pre-code was amazing. It was so much fun. I wish we could go back to that. I don't know. The reality is, I don't know. I don't know if I want to go back to that because there's an expense and intent. And yeah, it's cool. But, you know, the way we've structured our spring sensation sales series now, it's a little bit of a hybrid model. So, the animals are there. You know, I remember a farm. They're there. But then we're all able to kind of go up and almost more of a social setting, I would say. And... Is there natural habitat? Yeah, yeah. And the people natural habitat can't get you out of here. And we're able to, you know, I guess, quote, unquote compete against each other if you want to buy another animal, like you do on the other sale. But it's kind of a lot of fun in that way. And we don't have to have the animals

46:55going through the ring or worry about if the ones that will intent down or the storm's going to come through and find the animals as they're going through the ring. So, I don't know. I kind of like the way that we have structure at least our spring sensation sale series now, where you have the option to go out and look at the animal. These go look at the animals. And we do have that big sale where that comes in. And we ensure that we've got individuals that are qualified to look at cattle. So, if you're not able to make it to New York, you can call up, you know, one of those people that are on the list said, if not, feel the animals. And they'll give you one of my biased, honest opinion of what those animals are. I don't know. I like it. Okay. It seems it's stressful of having a sale is always going to be shit. But I like that for a minute. And it's... It has to say, oh, managers. Yes. We have... You're the sale manager. I was going to work for you. You have to find ways just to reiterate what I said before we've got to say one,

47:55because 15% doesn't go very far. It really doesn't. You know what I mean? You still have to pay fitters to come in and take care of the animals. You still have to allocate charges for feed and strong housing. And the people do that. But, you know, it works for us. And Cowboy has been incredible and being able to help navigate those sales virtually. I know there's sale coming up on Monday. I'll be sitting behind my computer screen. Potentially making some bits. And it's kind of nice for me as a potential buyer to do that, as I'm still able to move on farm and do my own thing. But it's... I don't know. I like the way that this hybrid model is gone. I like having some virtual sales and still having people that are bidding live at the same time. I kind of like that format. And we have had complaints of an unhappy buyer either, because most of them... If they're not there, they're represented by somebody who's... Well, but... It's complaint.

48:55Right. Yeah, they'll take the complaint. They're good thing. Yeah, I think, obviously, times have changed. But all these folks have been marketing through all those changes, right? So you just pivot. And you find your way. We have tag sales today. That's something that was involved in the last 10 years or so. And that's a unique approach as well. I do miss the fun, you know, the camaraderie, the excitement and the sale. And I love to see live animals in front of me, but that's less than less. And I think we have, you know, there's a ton of expense to bringing those animals and trucking them across the country. And we have health issues and risks and fitting and all of that. So, you know, we pivoted and changed, but it's still great. And Cowbuyer allows us to connect with people around the world that would be much more difficult to reach if we didn't have it. So I think it's been great. But I still, you know, they have the Nashville sale and no live animals, but they do such a great job

49:56to keep a high-tempo excitement. That's still fun when we have sales, right? So I think you just have to find what fits for you and, you know, continue to pivot the change. All right. Now, next question before I give each and every one of you a personal question, then we'll go ahead and questions from the crowd. You all have those mid-sales. All four of you. And you sowed your cattle and you sow good items along with it. If someone purchased an animal from you for a substantial price, what would, if I said you give them to make sure that they made the profitable returns on that purchase? And I'm going to add to that in the second part to what is the most valuable marketing lesson we've learned over the years. Something new, so you're going to convince the people or you're going to help them make money once the most valuable lesson you've learned. I guess that's kind of a little question,

50:56but I feel that no matter as a consigner, you want the same thing in return as a consigner to whatever sale, the Christmas sale, the PA sale, you want to try to get the most out of what your animal is and go through the rain. And we try to treat every consigner that same way, whether that animal brings $4,000 or whether that animal brings $40,000. I want to see a happy consigner at the end of the day and a happy buyer. And I think that's true for every sale management person. As far as helping them out or what you can do to help them along the way, you try to do that for everybody. If somebody gets help, maybe if somebody gets started that just bought their first 4-H calf, if they need advice on how to feed, you're going to do that for them or assist that with them. Whether it's somebody that's quilt season in the industry that bought a really high-price animal, you try to follow that animal and help them make the rain decisions. You know, just have those conversations about breathing,

51:57you know, feeding, whatever it might be. And I feel like that is one great thing that we've developed over a guest time with a lot of our return buyers and even new buyers and it's kind of that relationship of working with them and that open conversation that could be had. So what was the second part of the question? I forgot. It was probably the marketing lesson you've learned. Most God will marketing. I don't know about lesson, I guess. As much as I have a love-hate relationship with social media, it is a very important tool. But having the right people, I guess, surround you, whether it's your feeding crew, whether it's sales staff, just having the people around you that you trust and that other people trust. I think that's a huge, huge component to a successful sale. Okay, Beth. Yeah. So, again, I would echo that. I mean, I think when you're in the position

52:58of consigning an animal, if this is a long-term kind of thing for you and something you want to do again, you have a responsibility again to make sure that you continue to build that relationship. If you wanted to be something other than just a one-off, I sold that one and I'm going to retreat back into my honor or the world that I mentioned means not really good. So, but, you know, I think you have a responsibility as a consigner and as a reader to maintain that connection and kind of follow up, you know, are there family members of the animal that somebody purchased that have done well, or there's interesting new details or just reaching out and asking how an animal, somebody purchased, how was she doing, or what cool stories do you have about that, and hopefully that makes the buyer feel a little bit more like you're invested in the process and it wasn't just, well, hey, that's great. I'm glad I sold that one for that much money and that's a lot better. Have a great day. I mean,

53:58those connections and I think everybody's touched on it. Those relationships, whether it's relationships with the folks that you have on your sales staff that are trusted advisors to the buyers and to you as a consigner and a sales manager. Those relationships are important. We can do lots of cool stuff on social media. But, you know, at the end of the day, I think a lot of people want to talk to a human who's seen that animal or who has experience with that particular consigner and can say, yeah, that's not just a really good editing. You can be confident in that and that's, I think that's really important. I think as far as the biggest marketing lesson to learn over time, I mean, there's only have to learn repeatedly, like, I'm not super quick that way. But, always, I mean, always sell your best and that's fantastic when they go forth and do really well for somebody. You know, it's cool for us to have, you know, we sold Robin. I didn't even know it's a while ago. Now, I guess, but she went on him

54:58and integrity Robin went on and was 95 for her new owners and iconic pictures and fun stuff like that. And that's, that's a thrill when it had been fun to have her still. But, it's great to see them go forward and do well and somebody mentioned that marketing, he said, they'll always have your briefings. Always, always, always, no matter what fantastic things they'd want to do, that's always they're the best agreed. And that's, that's fantastic, marketing, do your homework, always, that's always a lesson. That's, yeah. So as far as, when we sell animals, we, if the fire wants us to, we try to ruin the contact or if they have questions, you know, we're pretty open, I think, and we're always pretty open about history of the animal. They flushed well, what holes work in the environment because a lot of times, you know, we're selling for

55:58in a California family. And so we kind of know what does or doesn't work in those California families. And, and we're about to, we try to be as open as we can with those discussions if the fire has those questions and we'll set feedback. It's kind of fun when you have a free to get buying a calf because they always have questions. You know, why do I do it? How do I eat that? How do I get a rope to feed? You know, what kind of pen do they need to get? Sometimes you get some wild questions. There's a lot of fun to talk to the kids about that. And, hey, you know, that gives it going back to us to work with. And you know, I see that with our own kids now. They'll ask these very questions, so I'm like, you're dying in love, and, you know, I should expect these crazy questions. So yeah, it's a lot of fun when there's little kids. And, young people, I should say, people that are asking those questions because, you know, keeps them energized, keeps us watching to keep tabs on how those animals are doing for them. We always also stand

56:58behind the animals, that we sell. There's been a few times that we've bought them back, or brought them back. You know, somebody was saying, hey, we can't get this cal pregnant. Like, what do we do? All right, do you want a big check? And, you know, how do you want us to do this? We'll give you the big check. And, just pay you, we'll bring her back, or we'll bring her back to the farm and get her pregnant. And, I think we've only brought them back, and they got pregnant first. You know, there were some issues with feeder, or whatever, at the buyer's farm. It doesn't matter, but we get them pregnant, get them far enough along to their second crack check, send them back to the buyer that was there. But, that's one thing we always do, is we stand behind the animals that we sell. Because, if we don't, then why are we so long? You know, we just don't want that reputation. As far as marketing lessons, we try to surround ourselves with really good people. I think,

57:58I think people are key to this whole business. You know, if you see us as show, it's usually the same team. You know, the Jack Ross goes with us to every show. He, he's our guy. For as long as we're able to have Jack Ross there, he's our guy. And, we want him with us because, you know, we have that relationship we know how to work with him. But, he also knows the cows. And so, when we start our shows in March, in New York, we're going to have the same crew through the whole year. That's, there are guys. There are teams. They're going with the, you know, they know the cows. And, if he gets really important, and that's, you know, that's just on the show side, of course. But, any of these marketing aspects that we do, you know, we kind of have our team. You know, we work pretty closely with Chris and Tom, you know, us working with him with their sales. And, I think it's important that we have those connections with the people to just build upon those relationships

58:58in this industry. Well, I got to tell you it's tough when you go after three smart ladies to think of anything intelligent to say that they have an already set. But, and I was going to mention what Alicia just said about scanning my own cowl, because that's something that's, and it's inevitable, right? If you sell a lot of cowl for time, something's not going to work out, and we just have always stepped up and said, how do we want to make this right? And, I think that's really important. And, buying for people like a trust is also really important as well. I mean, it's about people at the end of the day. And, the cowl are great, but, you're buying for people, so I think that's really important. But, you know, when we had our sale or registered sale, the higher-price care we sold to people smarter than us. So, we didn't really have to tell them too much, but, we have had situations where they wanted us to keep cattle for a while, or, you know,

59:58get started or whatever, and that's just what you do. It's just what you do. It's just what you do. It's about to market your cattle, and to help the buyer or whatever he did sell. I would say, advice a lot of what these folks have already said. But, I would say the best marketing thing I've ever learned is it takes a lot of work. It is constant effort, 365, to have your cattle, to develop the right kind of cattle that are going to be marketable that people want. Because, if you're the only one that wants it, she's going to be in tough sell. And, you can't tell people what they should like, right? The market will dictate it, and you have to understand the market, work her, present your cattle, fit into that market, and give them a soul. So, I think, the third work being smart about doing it is something that we've learned. Thanks, Bee. Well, to Cheryl's story, I had a step for one time that was in the sale and, you know, everybody calls it. Give me a range

1:00:58on her. Give me a range on her. I said, 25 to 40,000. Go! How about doing it? Well, on the back! So, it was a very prominent braider that can sign her, and I called love, and I said, this guy, he's got the cool and he'll send me a check the next day. He said, but, his major question is, he loves blue rhythms, but he wants it money back. Go! The fellow he says, well, he told me to get her bread, and I'll give him $750 for every embryo she makes before it's time to quit, I'll be having her. So, that's it! Go! The African's bread! And, he went right, started going right to the shoot. There were two weeks. She made, I hope. 2038. Well, lo and behold, it was about $1,200, and he sold probably $17,5 eggs because of what the seller told him that he would do to back up his purchase. Plus, you're getting the cabinets inside. Plus, you want some shows

1:01:58so everybody at the end of the day is happy. Now, they don't argue about that, but, the secret to the whole thing is, you got to make more going to your investments than you lived. You got to be, you got to try to be at least $60,40 or you have trouble. So, I'm going to conclude my portion of this, and then we're going to get into some questions for people online, as well as in the room, because I'm sure there's a lot of questions out here for these people, but, uh, I've got one question for each of them, and I'm going to start with you, Jenny. So, um, and I'm sure a lot of people want to know about this. So, obviously, you and your entire family, your three children, Nathan, play a huge role in the success of VR, Danny. So, those of you who don't know VR, there he is, go to the 7-Eleven, fill your guard up, and go home, because I know you know who they are. The most prominent showroom in the Jersey breed today, and their great-cow-sharrow dealt with triple-team.

1:02:58You're involved with them in showrooms, sales, et cetera, and your name is semonymous with theirs. However, you have not allowed that relationship, not in for a second, but in an interview with the continued success of triple-team holdings and jerseys. How do you maintain that, and how do you keep everybody smile? Honestly, it's an open and transparent conversation. Like we set up, we're very honest and let our expectations are, they are honest with their expectations, we've had a great working relationship, they're good people to work with, but we provide a service, we're going to do it 110%. And, you know, we've had, we have our own farm, our own cattle, our kids own cattle, our kids have bought and sold cattle, like we've kind of brought them into that. And, we want to make sure that we have something at the end of the day, and fear and dairy, and it's time to go different directions at some point in time. We are going to quit being us and ourselves

1:03:59to bring in somebody else. So, we're kind of like a love and a leave-it type of thing, I guess. We've, but luckily, in our situation, we all work great together, and it's working out well. But we, kind of like again, we have an X amount of spots in our hotel, we only know 35 heads. So, it's a balancing act, sometimes, on the triple-T side, we sell animals that maybe we wouldn't want to sell. Maybe we can sign a couple extra heads just because we don't have the room that normally we would keep. So, we have, but that's what makes us kind of continue and move on, and that's kind of our place in the market, too. Like we're always trying to, on the other hand, we have to sell X amount ahead to kind of keep our numbers of balance. We kind of know where that fine line is, of being too crowded and being able to allow those boardcats to stay there. So, sometimes we sell ones we don't necessarily want to sell, and that's kind of going back to selling your best. You've just got to be willing to put them out there

1:04:59and continue that cash flow and make it work to be able to vote 35 heads. Thank you very much. The next question is for Pete. I'm handing my down to Pete. Pete, and my experience has been clear that deep categories continue to market and market very well. Your vote was a cow that was very famous named co-vale, Demetitina. We all knew who was a cow that picked it. She was granted the Royals, she was dominated or all-American, reserved several times back to back. But we've been talking about Now she herself is a brand name but her category nice but not a brand name category but if you go to sales still today and you have to give us name in the category that animal I think still works well how is she breeds true but isn't cool how she started the real true breeding of that family but didn't have a

1:06:01brand name category she made a brand for herself that was a little bit about Dana in her story yeah so we've been really blessed to be able to work with some really special cows and and Beth is another one of those and you know Gino was just a really exciting young cow and a friend of ours and probably many of you know about Landis and her and and said hey I think you guys have to take a look at this cow you know she just just rushed a couple weeks and I barters in calf and I think she could be pretty nice so I saw Jade was down there he was just out of college and looked at her and he called me and said yeah I think we should I think we should partner with Bob in this cow so we brought her up to her place and we had some you know we're wondering what some show cows at that time and she came off the truck and I thought to myself why did he think we should burn this cow but she was you know just a couple weeks fresh and kind of a narrow river otter and just a baby right now

1:07:03just a milking yearling and the cow just blessed incredibly well just continued to develop we did our perch she did her part again and yeah you developed those kind of cows are well known everybody wants those genetics right everybody wants that special one and she did a lot that she made a lot of great daughters a lot of excellent daughters cows that have done well in the show ring pretty calves and cheerly helped get us there and that was the next one about that a great bad degree and you know we brought her down from from from Jenny and and Nathan and they helped us tremendously get that the damn rolling and then that was born and that's another great story for another time but yeah you just you just have to find the right individuals sometimes you know and and develop them and and the industry will embrace it and everybody wants that special one thanks me Betsy your next and we want to know you may have introduced it around about way but take us a little more in depth

1:08:07about your family farm how much your herds merchandise program have changed since your herds growing in the past 20 years and have you seen limitations on more ways than gathered a lot that's a lot thank you yeah so it's a great question absolutely like going firm in 60 cows in a Thai salad having that really finite amount of space to having a little bit more latitude on space and you know and maybe we're moving from meeting to sell a set number to be able to absorb more of those animals and and kind of just selling selling off the top that you know that's one change certainly as we changed size and scale you know I would say at this point count of our wives were pretty were sort of set so moving a little bit back into that so focusing on merchandising a few more

1:09:10so that's that's definitely changed over time I mean the the dairy population in New England has certainly shifted over time so 25 30 years ago there were there were club sales and there was a state sale Chris talked about coming up and working the main state sale and so there were more local marketing outlets from that standpoint so that's that's definitely different that's shifted over time and have to be a little bit more creative about whether it's social media or whether it's you know continuing to maintain those contacts whether it's going out showing someplace other than Maine for us you know just again that back to that brand sort of idea and making sure that we're aware of what's going on in the market so that's definitely changed over time as our her size has changed there's the second part to the question too maybe have you seen limitations are more ways to capitalize that's like like do you speak yeah yeah yeah absolutely so

1:10:11Maine's its own alignment so definitely different things that I don't know that we would have imagined 15 or 20 years ago whether we we breathe 30% of our cows to be so that right now that's that's more appealing than the milk check a lot of days so that's handy and that also gets back to that what's the number of cattle that we that we need to make either maintain or hurt signs or or that we want to put out a need to put out on on the market from that standpoint we would double the ice cream per minute or two that was like a around COVID sort of experience experiment but it takes a lot of time and anyways that like cows so there's that so the so again like the focus you know back to focusing on some of the merchandising focus and on some of the market and maybe being in a point in our lives where we kind of want to focus on the things that we enjoy doing like a short elitia it's obviously no field

1:11:11corners as a large presence of a social media for all facets of your herb what are some of the pros and cons in this tool how do you ensure that your post target reaches the target audience you want to for instance you put else you put back on some right now about the sale I don't know who's putting it up but what if I'm a cheese customer and I'm getting something about is it the algorithms to somebody control who sees what like your sale advertisement your cheese people or your why do buyers they don't see it do they or how's that work how do you control who sees this what am I asking yeah that's a great question so we do have four different pages there's an open forms very page which I manage and I've not done very well with that lately because it's been a lonely winter and I've been building and helping get our catalog done the past couple weeks so I've been a little bit slow I'm getting posted on that but basically the open forms dairy page on Instagram Facebook

1:12:17wherever else that chat and talk YouTube I don't do Twitter or whatever is called now basically that's focusing on cows and low genetics cows and the herd management of what we do on the farm day today there isn't dedicated Oakfield artisanal page and Molly who is our cheese maker she manages that page both with Facebook and Instagram and I think she's got another social media but I'm not for sure which one I did so I apologize but that's dedicated to the production of the cheese and and what we have available for sale in that regard there used to be a why do you page and we kind of morphed that into the artisanal page because we're we're doing the why do you through the air parks in the brand and then there is a lamp arms page and my sister and mom manages that and it's not like that I would say that it's more community based like Oakfield specific based then like Oakfield forms dairy we're trying to hit

1:13:22everybody in the U.S. and internationally so you know when you think about it in that regard it's kind of a lot and you know lovely we are a big farm and we've got a lot of things going on so it's great so the content is there the problem is just that I'm asked for help like from guys so it's you know it's kind of a one-man show where I'm trying to keep a somewhat diversified with a little bit of a focus and I just have to have time to do that on top of everything else so yeah it's it can be it's the someone job I don't know how everybody else manages their social media pages but that could be a full-time job in a farm when you're marketing cattle food whatever I mean there's a lot that goes on to it and don't ask me about the algorithms I'm too old for that I don't understand that it's I don't even I just like it thanks for asking by the way yes so yeah no it's it's good it's a great way of marketing well this is

1:14:23going to include my part we still have 45 minutes left for questions and I'm sure there's people out there online and in the crowd it wants to have a question for each and every one of you I just asked it one person just say I can cover that one and you just kind of passed a mic around so my first question we have sent in as what is the differences between marketing animals for show and marketing animals for function and reduction how do the markets and methods differ you got them like you can answer that with Jenny I think we probably already answered it but how do they differ as far as I guess on our end I think it's a little bit the same show animals especially the modern show cow has to be a cow that knows and it has to be a functional cow I think that that is where the two industries have come closer and closer together the days of having 68 inch you know two-year-olds that their front legs cross has slowly luckily started to drift away and it last five six seventy years so

1:15:29I think that those two worlds have come together a lot more I think when you look at sires that are available um sire selection yes there are still some pure type sires out there but they're looking like a lambda for instance and see that has kind of crossed into both worlds so I think there is a little bit of the same but as far as marketing of events obviously if we have a high type you know cow any nine point two-year-old we're not going to sell it in a commercial you know setting or poor commercial price so you kind of navigate and know your own animals and be honest with yourself and know what is what and the difference between what we're probably the hardest critics on our own animals and we're pretty critical I think there's lots of conversations live live conversations that go on in our house but we see things a lot the same but we also have different opinions which is a good thing so I think it's really fun to go to triple team one life one one kids standard so that's it that's that's a

1:16:30discussion for another day but and like this question a little bit is we're talking about show animals and functional animals really in our eyes we all show and we love to show but but show and function should be two words to go together now a lot of people that are not anti-show but they think a show animal is different than a functional one well that's what us people that show are trying to change we want that show animal to be medium-sized we want it to be functional we want it to be able to survive that freestyle slanted floor environment and there's nothing wrong with a cow like that when you pay a penny and yes there's more of those coming out all the time there's more great cows selling freestyle or it's all the time and you can go and say I don't care if it's tonight where they're selling a lot of brand-name cows in brand names or what sells or if you go to for instance brew makers the

1:17:34shipments bird a great-dairy sale they sell them out a lot of great cows have come out of their cow's been granted Harrisburg it's called right out of the bigger sale barn all you gotta do is just look and do a Christmas wall a little bit now they have any questions from the floor I have one that they did my fun that was texted in that tags on to that topic and maybe everybody can address it if they want to but if you don't have that photo of the folks show her what avenues are there for you to market those cattle the best and how can the value of those cattle be recognized in other words the great barn cows where where or how it may be best part so you know there's a tag line that I use once in a while on our social media post the kind we love to

1:18:35know and that's exactly what you're asking right there their cows with deep pedigrees they're amazing barn cows just truly great barn cows and I know we're gonna go win a show I'm at a center Harrisburg you can anywhere else like that so how do we market for them I don't know it's a great question you know we again are trying to promote cow families and the way promote cow families sometimes there's their buy-in for people and we have a wheelhouse right now she's not high enough she's like very free 50 round you know say it wrong but she's not high enough index to make holes anymore but she has and we're out of that but pop you in the head like crazy when you see her full of milk amazing cow and I took pictures over I go sooner and guess what we're selling them real year from the cow now so it's kind of funny how again some of those things resonate from you know yes she at one point was an index cow she's not anymore she's you know it's really almost four years old that's I

1:19:38guess how you're gonna have to do it is you know push the cow family side you know get a great shot of those where people love for your shots I mean it's incredible how many people you put a great rear on the carler and people really are drawn to that and and I think that's how you promote those cows I'm not saying any daughter for person numbering 50 grand or anything but I bet we can sell anything from five to ten grand from that which is a nice price profit yes for those animals like that and especially if you use a bowl that's hot that's gonna help increase the value of those cows as well and for those cows that aren't gonna win Harrisburg they aren't gonna win world area expo I can give you a perfect example you said five or six really nice male cast down the Dan and Bob sale and first set them and they all bought four to six thousand dollars nothing all of that and you got two and three lactations and dollars out of them already that's that's the kind of

1:20:39sale you put milk cows in that are into that four to six thousand dollar range because as we all know there's a huge difference between goodness and greatness and that a good Mary cow with a nice pet every is just milk and hungry now she can't be a seven on spade and sell and be pregnant 30 days and been in 240 days now everything's got to be lined up right the sematic sale stage of lactation is she bred back is she easy on the eyes does she have a nice battery automatically four to six grand and that ain't bad after you've got two or three lactations out next question Chris I've just you don't count my name or make about that it was you know maybe she's not gonna win Madison but she's a pedigree builder right if she's if she's that kind of cow well back in some of these shell cow pedigrees and look at some of those cows back in there that you do you never saw in a shell they didn't win Madison but they're 90 or 92 or 93 points and they made 35 or 40 thousand they are pedigree made

1:21:43so you know don't despair just because she can't win Madison today use that cow don't just let her die on your farm you didn't make anything out of her she's the one that you want to IVF you want to make babies make some really that you need meanings from that cow and build your pedigrees and that's how you get there yeah and if you don't know if there's everybody talks about expo but there's only 18 winners only 18 sorry folks that's it so you can compare everything to world area expo you got to have some fun at home first they okay I have one of it that was texted in and then blow it up be proud how does a small family farm breeding high-type cattle get the get their name on the map and get sales selectors to visit their farm 8 6 7 5 3 or 9 we're gone first right though we're not afraid to go we're not my readers I mean

1:22:49pay attention like we watch social media I don't know how many times Nathan's like yeah I go I bought one where do you see it snapchat I don't know I mean there's random places and things it just you never know it's gonna catch somebody's eye but the sure met thing is to reach out to somebody and let them know you're interested because if you've never sold before or maybe somebody can stop your farm but you know four or five times and you never want to sell but now the sun you've had to change your heart you don't let people know and let people be aware a good picture can sell right right it's not you know we've all seen the kind of fluffy pictures as far as I can on fluffy pictures sometimes a very pose the very what are professional photos I did it I there's still a place for that there's embryo interests you know there's still professional photos that are you want it for your your all Americans you're all Pennsylvania you're there's places for everything but just like we did for this sale here taking the honest picture with your with your phone and putting it on Facebook

1:23:50letting people see the different angles that I have for it's very transparent as well like there's a place for everything and doing all of them is a important thing as a designer well listen to me all actually all three of those questions kind of get at the same thing we talked about it earlier what so what's your responsibility as a designer or reader if you want to market like maybe that then if it's a show's specific kind of thing you're doing then we gotta get on to a show I mean that's that's fairly straightforward in touch with somebody who can help you with that if it's that fantastic bar on cow I mean make sure you do all your homework make sure their score make sure they're you know they're doing the things that they need to do that they're counting back regularly and that category continues to get stronger and I think these these guys said it said pretty clearly pick up the phone or the car message somebody or nobody nobody see my readers they they don't know that you're interested in selling something

1:24:52unless you let them know that so definitely do know I got one I don't get answer because I can't I hear it all the time too and this came in all next can somebody tell me the definition of a pre-agent so I'm assuming the question is in the reference to and those from the NLCS so a free agent is anything that you don't have a contract on so if you do not have a contract on an animal if there's not a contract on the seamen that is used to make that animal she's a pre-agent okay I just said beyond there Rogers I don't ask me anything else about cows I know sports I don't yeah so that would be a free agent so it's just like you know any of our show cows that we own all right that you know there's not gonna be a contract

1:25:52unless it's a contract between partners that home and animal yeah you're probably going to hear this type of yeah you know I'm going to hear you know number one pre-agent yeah yeah so no that just with me that there's no you didn't sign a paper saying that I can't sell this animal okay good question or you're down don't you'll be second okay question kind of leave that don't feel to know if you're flushing I'll ask for a more to use than it is a less restricted you are a contractor or you know early lease their contractor they really flushes with the very most for circuits don't use the you know or you not really look back you look for it just be able to deny that so every studs a little bit different there are some that are extremely restrictive

1:26:56as we know and some of those restrictions it's not just the resulting calf or calves that are born from a mating is the next generation and potentially the second generation that are restricted by that stuff so there's some pretty strict contracts to do this stuff other studs and I'm not gonna name any names because I'm just not but other studs are our reenrollment and that really is in center for us as breeders to use bulls are from those studs especially the rain cry because then you have a resulting potential female I mean the bulls are gonna go back to that stuff that's no big deal but if there's not restrictive contract on any resulting females then that leaves it open you could potentially sell that female or the decent amount of money if she tests

1:28:00well or you can just keep her and continue building generations yeah so for us as breeders as long as the dam herself does not have restrictions and there's no restrictions on the scene that's what we like we make it happen and unfortunately that window of bulls that are available gets tied or in tied for every day I'd like to address that too I think you really need to understand what the contracts are from each one of the studs what are you signing what is that gonna allow you and not allow you to do and the more restrictive contracts that are out there tend to be for people who want to accelerate the genetics within their own or they're not traditional marketers they're not really necessarily looking to market they are looking for tremendous level of genetic improvement as best as they can get it further and you know they tend to be people who are doing

1:29:03some type of mating and you know genomic testing and just trying to capitalize and create the most and they're my profitable cattle for their herd so that you know that's how they how they view it if you're gonna market that's a different world you better understand what you're signing if you want to be a market Jordan I'm tying into the genomics and the index side if you were talking to a younger here that has an action for indexed cattle and the lay-knackle industry has changed but how important recipients are and how important these contracts like I think what it likes because you get around trying to tap into the next market or is it kind of a close time I would never say there's no right I mean they're there is I would and we want to have four different answers here but I would say for about young person I think the best way if you really want on you know it it really is shots on goal right I mean if I want to win in the

1:30:07high-napped area the TPI world I need to fill some parts of the law if that's just the way it is right because even the highest animal isn't always good to make the nest I stand we've seen changes right so I think economically I would say embryos are a good way in by some embryos but they might be a little bit cheaper than going out and buy that $120,000 high net married half of it right and then the other ways maybe an idea session that those would be the ways I think as a young person you can get in partnering with somebody who's got a larger and resips that's what we do on the type side it's a win win again you know I think Jenny mentioned communication with burgers critical have written out this is what I expecting this is what you're expecting everybody has to win for it to be good but you're right resips are expensive but there may be a larger that has resips that would love to do what you want to do you buy an ABS session or some embryos and use their uterus and you're off and run and just

1:31:13echo a little bit but you remember Alicia talking about that cow that she pictured on a rotary that's 3300 bit 33's that's the kind of cow you can get in on an index family it might not be the next generation it might take you to her two generations maybe three but if you breathe over it to the hot siders and may stay hot then you're off to the races but we still got to supply the resips you still got to get the bread you still got to have healthy females you still got a test there's a lot of things attached to it it's not like you're gonna I don't think you're gonna ring the bell on generation but it's a forum and it's nice index that people from a cow people obviously there's a bet and yeah I would say I think the abscessions are becoming a little bit easier to work with just because you can select the bull that you want to use on that damn and you can select a free agent bull to use on that damn and the best way to do that would need to talk to genetic consultant that you trust you know

1:32:16we we work closely with each of the studs to go through different bulls that are available so any of the stud consultants work with them or just somebody then you know that you respect that would be able to say hey you know this is a free agent one go buy the IVF session work with if you're a small barn find that farm to implant you know input and resips make sure they understand if they've never done embryo transfer work what is involved you're not just bringing the cow you know there's some stuff so you have to make sure that they know the process and understand that process but I would say yeah I think that's probably the easiest way quickest way to get into a good family and a good cow that you could potentially make some money on eventually and build internally on their own farm anybody else I got another one texted well let's say you mentioned realistic values to fitting into the right kind of sale could you all

1:33:17side of Poland where we far exceeded that expectation and how and why it's been achieved well I can't really put one into it I mean we've had we've had counties sales where you have a genomic one back in but we could sell genomics for a lot of money if they were cut down that far exceeded our goals but I guess well doc nobody we didn't nobody expected to bring one $1.9 million a day but the hardest part about that was trying to trying to say it in my chant but she should be one that most far exceeded my expectations and actually she's proven she could make a back so you guys I don't know that we have anyone that far exceeded our expectations you know we've had some big offers privately on a few cows that we've turned out there's several then you know you think it's gonna bring 5,000 breaks to all hard yeah 17 it only takes two

1:34:19people it didn't ask the thing I exactly you know that's the exact point you get guys that go through them again peppers in the barn when they're brought for our sale you get all you need is those two guys that fall in love with that helper or that young cow and they just go like okay all right you know we'll take it on the other side sometimes there's an animal that like you'll really like it and it brings half of what you think so you know that we look at it as a long average is it all that it all has to have a job but yeah I can't remember any specific samples they've done big day got any ground so brown I haven't I have no rejection but I don't think it's like question folks do I name joy joy joy to the world here go ahead so this is not as big question about genetics so much about how long in fact how long are you two or two guys to get to where you work today so I am a partner and family farm I am young and smarter I love

1:35:23that you don't expect to be in the back so I need to go right there she is young but I want to be a part of it I am in the genetics I love to do that so I love to show how we're all and I'm even a personal general growth I have my father who used to count how long they will something I have my sister used to five answers and you might as part of it sports being that doesn't love it like I do and then I have a brother of all it's kind of a mix I have a brother that's supporting me on it from first half of the year ago this time now I will have his hundred percent support one thing we would always do back week when every plant I would make but I would be 100% pretty good back how well I do this the rest of my burgers if you're being the back we want this show down that this is the different out there you need to be able to help us get profitable and that's not the next level and how long will you guys say it so you talk about any other burgers everyone your burgers 100% love the show

1:36:25now I'm in the West California so John and I started the genetics and you know luckily large large family so you know one partner focuses on the crops of manure one partner focuses on you know the commercial cows you want to call that and and John and I do the genetics off so you know it's kind of a distinct in that regard so it's nice and you know we started this back in 1997 we bought our first animal and in 2025 with one brand of X-Fo which was incredible right so that's how about 20 years ago like that 29 years ago and you know when you start in this business and the show side you know that's the

1:37:26ultimate goal I think I mean I think if you're showing how's that's the ultimate goal right and it took us 28 years to get there so I think you know as you go through this progression you got to look at it incrementally like you know the first couple of years we were like third place at our county fair oh my god you know that's awesome we didn't lose you know and then you go to the state fair or regional fair and you do well then so you really have to look at those things incrementally so our first champion at a national show was 2018 Nathan was the judge there and I'll forever love him because he made my carol Sarah her own there and you know so that took us 20 something years to get to that point and then another almost 10 years so when I spoke so you really have to look at those things incrementally and I think set expectations for where you want to be and then I think those are the discussions that you

1:38:27have to have with your partners is that no we're not welcome yeah you can go out and you know what you want to buy a candy cane okay I'll sell it you know me tell you I'm just gonna cost though you know and then that's that's really how you have to look at it yeah you can go win tomorrow if you want it's gonna cost a fortune to get there so if you look at those steps you know baby steps and doing it and I'd economically responsible man or just you know the set goals over the years to accomplish that and it's about branding and your case you got a great cast lady and you got to involve brand name because everything everything and I know what you're a I know exactly what you're a bunch you got to have said there's no one said I don't know if it might be like that it might be I might figure out I don't think my partners are still like my

1:39:29brother-in-law is just it ain't going over like you know that you have to convince them I understand that it's gonna happen it's gonna be fine and so they know it's just not trying to support a dream it's just a dream of folks so we're small obviously but everybody on our farm to say that they love show me I was just probably not gonna be alive I mean if there was everybody's kind of got their thing that they're really good at and everybody has a job that's small scale versus your scale but on the same token I think you have to show the value of what you're doing and that's merchandising as you've ever been to your place you got a great great her cows great people just continue to you bargain merchandise and show the income from those investments make some investments that's the other part that we don't really talk about we talk about selling but find into a good cow family and merchandising them down the

1:40:31road I think that's where I need to keep the receipts show the investment on you know what your return is on your investment and it's gonna take it's not gonna happen overnight like her said but it's just slowly showing whether it's selling embryos selling haveers out of that there's always cost on the investment though too if anybody ever said that they've won on everything on the one animal because it don't work that way if you're 60-40 you're a positive very much yeah that was an interesting discussion so you know John and I talked for years about ways to diversify the farm and you know we see neighbors making you know different products milk you or whatever and we also hear in

1:41:37anybody that's processing milk here in this room probably knows milk has an expiration you know dig it great so we did not want to get into milk who would milk because of the expiration date so what we do we win into fresh cheese which has an expiration date but the reality is that we wanted to do something unique and different in New York there's my 500 different kinds of cheddar cheeses that are made artisanally and on farm maybe not by the way but there's a lot and there's a lot of yogurt centering on far so we wanted to do something that was very unique and very specific and you know in our research you know we had Molly went out to grocery stores and said what are people asking for like what is something you know and a cheese or whatever what is a dairy product that is difficult to get that people are asking for and Mexican cheese came up multiple times so as we investigated that and then really looked into how many

1:42:40cheese processors in the US and in New York make Mexican style cheeses there's three in New York I think one shut down they're both in the city and the Hispanic population in New York state is like 20% and in rural farming areas that population is even higher and so large farms 60% of our work forces Hispanic were like where do you guys get your food from yeah it's it's gross it you know sometimes from Texas sometimes from Wisconsin it's gross it's you know it's not authentic so little did we know we had a built in like a group of people that could help us design a product that they liked that was as unique and as representative of their culture as we could help make it you know from our house in New York state so long answer to your question I apologize but that's kind of the story of how we got into the Mexican style cheeses and yeah all three are fresh right now but we're looking at Molly's

1:43:45working on a an age to cheese right now so we'll get there eventually and I have to have an expiration date with them like four or five weeks question go ahead and remember student cheese are you using the bill from your show work yeah so that's a good question to you and initially we wanted to do it from the show pal so the way our show where it is we have 28 and like a little I think it's a 3,000 gallon tank or 3,000 pounds and anyhow it's a tiny little tank in there and so we really wanted to process the milk from the show cows however because of show seasons the the variability across seasons was going to be way too extreme so we actually pull up from the commercial herd and process at break there's a small little area right in the part of the building that we're processing it right from the commercial

1:44:46herd any other questions do I accept from me or some I have all right Jenny what has all four of Jenny this is from do I everybody knows do I this great question who was your greatest mentor what was the most valuable wisdom they imparted to you very good question there's been a lot of them I don't know if I can narrow down with one I grew up on my family farm northeast Ohio my family is there still milk house obviously that's where I got my start met Nathan that is Ohio State there he broke up with me once and we somehow we ended up back together but it invited about that all but you know you know

1:45:46honestly you know adventures are always people you look up to and there's been a lot of people that helped us out a long way some went best still some that aren't you know like when he was a great friend and both Nathan and I and our whole family and we lost him and you had a lot of first I would say together on in the show role on the sale side we always joke that you know a lot of first he was there you know the day after I went in you know on our couch he was there you know there's just a lot of things along the way but he was probably a big mentor for us and helped us along the way with with our sale business but also with the show cattle and helping us kind of keep moving the right direction personally I'd say Nathan he's my best friend but you know we see a lot of things same but he's helped me I guess a long way of having a little more confidence and in my opinions and being able to voice those opinions and giving me I guess back beyond whether it's you know judging or

1:46:51whether it's you know talking with your side whether it's marketing sometimes it tells me things I don't want to hear and I got to be open to that be able to take it and after the first couple four-letter words you know then you know accept and move on and it'd be better for it but I think that's been a good thing as far as our partnership is unlike but also business partners just can be tricky sometimes but it's pushed us to be better oh we're gonna have a line so definitely my parents you know they've been immersed in this world for forever you know they meant a show a thousand years ago approximately so you know there were some things that were sort of laid out like that but we've been really fortunate my husband and I and my parents were very open to be clear about the things that they were really passionate about on the cow side cow family side and those kind of things but at the same time

1:47:55being really open to you want a little more cows okay that sounds great it will be lovely if we get all by groceries every week and you know not have to pick a week of the month so they were pretty open to doing things differently and and that's not just on the day-to-day farm activities I think that extends to what are we doing with with breeding cows and what are we doing with merchandising as well so that's been really important to us they have their I was gonna say guidance but feedback and somebody commented about lively conversations those those definitely happen as well that are pretty notable so Jonathan has been very fortunate with his business department from department his dad is retired now and there's a non-family business department that manages the crops and the manure and you know you think about a couple of 20-something kids back 30 years ago you know living on a shoe

1:49:00string and then living in a during ground for dream in your head and and they kind of said okay you know go for it and and that's pretty incredible that you know people that have a larger business it was a large farm at the time still have the trust and yeah like I said a couple to my sons to be able to do that so they've been incredible meant or especially Jonathan's dad has been so supportive you know he isn't a part of it but he um they'll still want to raise something when she's your king all you know he's like oh that's so cool you know like this person you know we had a number of bull that you know and just so supportive of the accomplishments that we've had in this business for you know the past 20-something almost 30 years so that's you know incredible mentorship for us from the marketing side two of the best friends two of the best people I should say three that we've ever had were Dave and Mary

1:50:04Brahma at Morris back is the way we started our sales series back when we have like nothing you know and they came in and you know Brad Kiyam and built Kiyam you got the greatest thing you know you average 2500 bucks on the sale and I was like all right it good you know and then Horus's he always would say buy the best and breed them better and that's something that we've really took to heart and now we really worked with him and those guys from the marketing standpoint just you know you can't replace people like that and and we were so fortunate that they were supportive of us in our early days and still to this day they're almost yeah I started a great question to think about I was ahead a little time so I was glad I was more than this one but yeah I would say for me for sure my dad he certainly you know he was a German immigrant and he worked hard and he sure taught us to work hard you know we used to pick out of them all the time about you know we we have to go pitch frills and coin

1:51:07stocks to bid happy to bet half-ours and there'd be a five-time four with only two times on but that's that that made your mind and but that's what you believe then and I never I never regret that for a minute I also had a professor friend of Cornell Dr. Golden of a huge influence on me as a young person to treat big plan well and this guy's a limit and you know I don't know that I wouldn't done some of the things that I did without his influence so really appreciate that and you know as we we got into the show world more you know my boys and I do it as a team with my boys blessing most of the time but we we really do and when there's disagreement it's always going to be two boys against one dad that's usually how it goes but good luck great we we talk about it every day we live it every day and I'm sure they wouldn't tell you that you know general German downpastures evokes source of that a tremendous

1:52:12influence on them and the business side and what they do in the show and merchandising world as well thanks me and for me it's obviously your your mother your father your number one mentor so I certainly echo that I lost my dad very young age I was 23 years old I lost my dad the cancer some of you knew some of you didn't when he was at the state auctioneer and he's what handed off the level of auctioneer to me and my mother she raised a wild child for a while and he got in control of that most way but definitely my parents I was bought up doing the right thing they taught me to do the right thing they taught me to treat everybody as you treat yourself then yeah I also say that about my uncle my dad died my uncle Norman kind of took over keep me in line and I worked with him on a lot of sales but nobody wanted my wife to end her parents and her cousin Chad was so fortunate to marry into that family and they just

1:53:12done me great and I love what we got going now we got to have a small partnership and some cattle and show cattle and not family members probably one of the guys that gave me my most chance was Richard Green guy that single Angelie made the red breed what it is today Richard was one hell of a guy if he happened to know me he loved red cattle and the fairs of good red cow it was good for for whatever it cost he gave me my chance at managing sales I managed greatly there for a little while and the other one is Curse and Ande they gave me the opportunity to manage their spursal when they put Malcolm cows and that's when Dean and Ashlyn were hot it was a very very successful sale when they lived in Shipingsburg and I certainly appreciate them for giving me that opportunity but I think they're all on and on and on about the people that have done me well and I certainly appreciate it more questions for the crowd but more particularly I'm thrilled that there's a lot of youth in here are there any

1:54:12juniors that have a question don't be shocked I don't even see any arms up anyone okay I do have one that somebody texted in and we can go a little past three if we need to and I already know the answer but I'm gonna ask it for everybody to answer if someone loves cattle but it does not show or have resips to market index animals how can they invest in the business yeah I think we talked about that a little bit you know there's lots of ways to get into business partnerships are a great way that's allowed us to do things that would be absolutely impossible without those partnerships we could never be involved in some of the cattle that we've been involved in without having great partners so that that takes more work and it takes a lot of our work communication is paramount having similar goals and direction is really

1:55:17important in that but two people could give more down than one so I think that's a great way and then specifically with embryos or IVF sessions allows you to get into cattle that maybe you couldn't afford otherwise but partnerships are fantastic if you're good at communication yeah I don't quite know how to answer this I think you could look at it and go a few different ways so if if yeah you don't have the financial means to buy a big one try to partner up with somebody like me so I think that's one way to do it the other thing is you know you don't always have to like be on the farm there's other ways to be involved in the cemetery that's working on a farm you know I'm looking I got Miss Jean not the corner of my eye here who I saw come on crunches and I'm gonna ask you what's going on but you know you can invest in this industry in so many ways you know Jean works for a day and and it's you know

1:56:20an amazing thing that she's doing promoting you know the products that we make every day and and that's you know we've got a financial invest in an animal though she has done that as well but you know there's different ways to do that if you want to you know yeah go work on a farm we have robots you know working with a robotic company to just you know learn the different aspects of working in the cemetery there's so many different ways to be involved ways I definitely did not know about when I was the other person and I wish I did not that I regret any decisions or the direction that my line was taken but I just you know there's so many opportunities out there for people to be involved in this industry and there's different ways to invest and in this industry you have to be creative I mean just just think of the raccoon and trash can not trash feed but I think you know whether it's Mark that was like there's a

1:57:23little thought that seemed to work but it's all right but it would be creative I mean I think if we think about the opportunities for young people thinking of the two mirrors of the more the population is young people and think of my age now and that's really disconcerting but your career path and your involvement in the dairy industry is going to look different than than ours that the opportunities are different I mean it's not I'd like the a hurts person on a farm or I'm not going to be able to farm all right I'd like to be on the show site I'd like to be a fitter or I'm not gonna be at all I mean there are a lot of in-between whether it's partners but communicate communicate communicate on that and maybe it's some weird opportunity that you feel like just falls into your lap that goes back to the communication and that goes back to the connections like the people that are sitting in this room and the people that you know maybe you follow on social media there's some weird connection that you didn't even realize that you were two people removed from somebody else that would take advantage of those connections and be willing to

1:58:26take a little bit of risk going down to the risk obviously be aware of what you get into but take a little risk I'm trying to pick up the crumbs from everything everybody else said here but all good points I think from the marketing standpoint or the sale management standpoint there is a buy in every sale no matter how good the sale is we talked about you know panel that exceeded your expectations but there's some that don't meet their expectations of what you think we've all done it there's so the animals that we thought they sold maybe under value there are multiple buys in every sale so kind of talk to somebody you trust and pay attention attend those sales and pedigrees great pedigrees around there on another note I mean we've had a lot of interns come to our farm and work for us and help us over the years and some have opted to be paid in embryos that's one way to get into families and you know and do some work and get embryos

1:59:28for payment to also you know make your herd and create your own herd so thank you very much Jenny if there's should be winding this up if there's any more I got one over the technical line just now that said as the group what animal they've also got animals for a lot of money in public sales which one of your animals that you sold in a public sale blew you away the most with the price they bought I think that's it it was a jersey mac and cheese she exceeded our expectations we we knew she was special but like you said it takes a couple people that get excited about one and that was one that they kind of went at work and it was fun to watch and I don't know if all everybody to see it again it would be in the general yeah but I mean I sat there and I think I was lurking in the shaking at the same time

2:00:29and that was one of our first sales that we had first year I think we did jerseys and it was pretty crazy so yeah I don't know if there's one special certainly not the type side we we were kind of we kind of knew where they would land um when we did have our sale uh we we had consignments um when we had a state picnic sale we did our own thing with that and what what geno ones were really hot and we were playing in that arena we we had a man of ladies I was ready 40,000 and she brought 100 so that was a wild day and you just never got one right but um we just didn't expect it yeah there's so many good stories about public sales I mean you can uh it's good when you undershoot them but sometimes when you overshoot them that breaks your back down to reality and that does happen too but that's something we have to accept and that goes back to what all these people said don't be afraid if I have to look back for my life I'm getting way old

2:01:31I I've let us take him more risk because can't look at it in the bank I mean if you take a little bit of risk see what happens but you also after remember your deal with a perishable product so yeah I do have one more I brought up the genomics and I forgot about it we sold an idea session around a sheepster said 2024 uh overall elastic and expected she well will just say she brought 10 times more than we thought it would give her which was we were sitting at dinner and John was like okay we didn't know about a line now so we got a nice line that night so that it glows away yeah you guys think those were complete lightning strikes where was there something that helped you know for my question I was going to go with was there something that pushed that momentum to make in that lightning strike happened that that's where I was kind of getting that crystal back there well for me it was a cow at bread somers we sold her up and at the entry when it was a blonde and we knew she was

2:02:36going to break a lot of honey but boy would you bring one and she sells her that much clunky now there was several partners but it kind of makes you a bloody clump of lady you think I mean can you feel the momentum coming yeah because she was on the feet and she had one New York's spring show black hand red and Jeffrey was all over his one seller so I knew he had her feet on the ground going into it down that bunch which you bought off the all the ground I think guys are like a designer sale manager you try to do all the right things like you're trying you you have the animal broke you haven't read you have them in the show shape you have them you did the pictures you did in the videos you do everything possibly you make the phone calls I mean everything's kind of you got to build everything up but then there's a little bit of luck if I'll take that I mean let's just be honest I mean you try to do all your homework and do everything you possibly can it's in your control but again until those you get in that room and as sale management you try to build an atmosphere that's exciting if we all sat here and talk

2:03:37monotone how exciting about atmosphere is that yeah you got to build an event and build us an excitement have some hospitality it all plays into it and we all like to come together I mean sales or social events for people we all like going to them talking visiting catching up seeing good cattle but if you bring it we'll create a buzz and get that atmosphere going and get all the right people in the room I think that's what helps make it really a successful event and sometimes what else is cool is you should be in the sale atmosphere three hours four sales starts we you know and you have a cow there that's trying to get so over a lot of money and somebody will come to you here give me spits he's interested in her whoa what the heck see my heart for so I don't know that he's interested so it's another guy's listening to you say that you miss miss once that cow well two guys will stay up hurting two so they're calling all they're gonna put you miss miss once that cow you know she might want a little cow oh yeah you're spits once or I won't make you bend but then just you don't see it's people are

2:04:42offended and I'm not gonna say any names but we know something will not quit when they want something and I was here tonight or she and enough Josh oh gee that's a nice one you got a hurt leg if you didn't pick you can you hit me with a chair I guess and the size of it gosh look the same good to respond about people do the growling there's diverse sale manager people about their sale uh what are some things maybe for them what you get asked tell them about the sale of what are some things that you can do to make those account for anybody or either an orange or an orange sale so the hiring good sale manager look there's the romantic thing or there's some things down that line as far as hiring like people to help you

2:05:43you have to hire the people that best represent the cow you have to match the product with the man that sells the product with his clientele and it would mean like you can't have a high-type slash and share when I shouldn't say it that way I would just mean a high-type sale and get your top genomic guy country he's not gonna be any good because he he don't represent the kind of people to buy that kind of cow and vice versa if you have a genomic sale for instance the sale on the sun series none of us guys gonna work that sale because we don't have genomic clientele that's just kind of the way you got the match the product with the person that sells product right yeah it comes down to presentation and promotion right do the job with the cattle at home do the job with the cattle at the sale have the right cattle to fit the sale and promote them all promote sell those cattle make phone calls and get get it out there and I was just going to say one thing

2:06:44I'm the last question too is you have to get involved if you want to get in we're small industry but I bet most of you know all the people here because you see them right they're involved in things outside of just their own farm and you have to do that because as you rub shoulders with others that think like you do and want to sell cattle and buy cattle and involve them what you love so I think it's really important to survive committees get involved meet people learn from people ask lots of questions that is that is gonna promote you a lot faster than if you stay in your own farm and see nothing but your own farm and I know it's tough to you know I get that but you have to make that effort if you want a branch out and I'll say like for us with our sale Jamie black he's I guess I think he said he manages her shop outside he's the one that's making contacts to reach out to people to work or sale and when he calls those people he knows

2:07:47that they have a built in if you want to call of that buyers list that said yeah whatever Jim bomb whatever he said his name was he's got certain people that he's gonna call you know to that they know that those people trust Jim off here and are gonna you know he's gonna call them they're gonna say what do you really think of this animal this is what we want what do you think of her and you know that's that's how we select or how Jane I should say selects our sale contacts for our sale and they're not hard for selling bad cattle either they're hard because they call the right people for the right fit and they need to be on state I'm just like we were talking I shouldn't say nobody but that is many people good sales anymore yeah I would agree with that I think when I think of sales that we've had sales that you go to and you think of people on sales staff that you just know under your 100% compliment that you can trust their assessment

2:08:51of an animal I mean pick that to frame in the line always where a million and a half sales and you could be 100% confident that whatever you told you about a lot and a sale was exactly exactly what she was and you know when when we're on the buying side I mean that's the kind of person you want to contact to tell me more about that animal and you see them have you what else what else should I need to know what and on the selling strategy one be confident that those are the people that are on sale staff that are going to make sure that it ends up going who mostly to your expectations and sale manager I mean we try to put people on staff from geographically in different places so that way if somebody in PA that we have somebody from this area that people would trust that you would know but familiar face somebody that you talk to but we try and cover kind of the US and Canada geographically with a variety of trustworthy people

2:09:58and I think it's important too that we have people that are going to reach out to clientele they're not just going to go to your sale that we have to give them a check from working a sale promoting your animal and they're going to sit here and say well I call it made because it's not your job supposed to call people you're supposed to create interest in that that wasn't one of Raymond's best attribute he would bring him Raymond would bring a whole book and he would call every single person and that's that's gone as far as I'm concerned that there's not many people that do there is some but there's not many and it's just like the job of being a rainman that's trying to disappear after the first 20 we have to start recruiting people to be a rainman so folks of your own I think they should keep your job or we'll try to embarrass you they didn't so I guess more of an observation and kind of a sort of a lesson for the kids and everything but I in back in 2018 there was this little white cat a little December white cat that was on the

2:11:00outfield sale I just love there and I thought I don't need to buy it now you buy things it was the end of the sale and I got to tell many and if you'll tell yeah you can get this out of here for a 2200 bucks because I saw the video because they did such an amazing job and I just I love white cat and water for 2200 bucks and it was a field theme or frisbee who is a sister to put loose and that was before put loose was put loose and so sometimes you have to think about trusting your gut and like Joyce said and saying when I swiss I bought them joy she sent me a picture and I was like I need evidence like I have to have that and so and so my point is to find me or more sure but my other point to tie into was what I said was that as the years went by I kept sometimes with Jamie Black about frisbee and he kept in touch with her Alicia knew she was and then when she did well I was here with Skirr

2:12:01Jamie Black was out for a taster from me and take certain things and then she's part of the senior S3 and so with footloos and so like that's and to choice point it takes a long time I mean that doesn't happen overnight and so I think these conversations are so great and I just think a lot of it is stressing your gut too like what you like and it is a lot I mean it is a lot that I have like a cat who uses his third footloos through that being footloos but I just I commend all of you I think you've all done a great job and I just hope everybody goes on something I think it's so cool thank you oh and I have a granddaughter frisbee in the sale tonight. That's how we know what we're going to do because nobody else is going to do a lot of work. David P. H. I. I don't know the wrapping up with you. I'm just going to add that. Well listen after a published about 30000 at Beckett sale that day the next one in the ring was

2:13:02her daughter by Denver. Denver is a little give people will right no not not hot but she's a good effort. Michael Hughes Royal Bista from Wisconsin Walker he's got a whole new franchise and she's 94 points and she's 94 points and she's a group girl. He he started his franchise and if you ask to be out everybody else was buzzing about what a footloos she's brought and he was the guy who was interested buying that effort he pulled the trigger trust me you're going to hear a lot more about the name of Robus. You know that's what's cool about that family when you buy from an F family you got to remember that it's more bottom side than top side because footloos is out of a branch and in she's a Denver out of the solid and bringing great stuff. So don't run down all the bulls before you look at these patterns but then it manage a footloos. Big red white from the old red type of she had all the tools she overcame her side. Thank you. I think we've

2:14:05got two really nice seminars. That's all to you ladies and your staff. What's it mean it's all about the people. Again it's all about the people. He's housemates together but the connections the friendships they trust that's what makes it all great. So do we tell them to give it the night like that a bit? Yeah see we just coach 12 from two a day to an end of Alice. It's pretty awesome but before we give them a rousing round of applause I just just a little housekeeping. The pre-sale meal is going to be a buffet. It's served out there. If you already have a ticket you can eat the food. Otherwise you can hang out in here and we have the sales starting in seven but the food's from 630 to 730 but before that if you would like to see our best and brightest dairy bowlers go at it. The finals will be you can't go through that door but it's only the other side of that wall. It's a series of rooms for him locked out and hickory but if you'd like to check that out and check out dairy bowl or see how our men's menu kids are doing

2:15:08you're inviting to do that at four o'clock. The dairy bar is excellent so enjoy that. We thank you for your questions. Give these both folks a big round and maybe you can stand up with a problem. That's the full market like a pro panel from the Pennsylvania Holstein Association Convention. Again massive thanks to PHA running this great session. Be sure to check out Holsteens.com for their events, sales and youth programs. Key takeaways, consign your best, stand behind what you sell. Use social, cow buyer and embryo sales to beat low milk prices and build relationships. Your prefix travels farther than any truck. If this fired you up head to the bullvine.com for the full article with photos of foot loose, dundee page, candy cane and more. Plus our breeding rankings, TPI lists and farm profiles. Subscribe wherever you get podcasts like share on Facebook and drop a comment. What's your go-to move for marketing registered cattle from the bullvine team? Keep challenging the sacred cows. See you next time.