Farmer Focus: Diversifying has helped US business
Jessica McIsaac © Brianna Frey Diversifying our family farm has been a key priority in recent years. For six generations our family has operated dairy farms within the same county in northern California.
In the past five years we have begun diversifying our farm, which wasn’t common for us in years gone by.
We began by transitioning our cows and dairy operation to comply with national organic standards. There was a big trend shift in our area for consumers and processors and we decided to take a risk and follow the trend.
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Becoming an organic farm was the best change we could have made. It opened the doors to price increases and a longer, more stable market.
In the future I hope to grow our organic milk sales even more by producing our own farmstead product. There is a lot of competition in this sector, but still room to offer consumers something different.
We also diversified into organic pasture poultry. Our first flock was 1,500 hens and currently we have about 7,500 hens. We expanded from selling unfinished product to having our own brand and also custom packaging product for other companies.
Future plans within our egg division involve expanding into the Los Angeles metropolitan area with a new branded product. This will allow us to secure our sales with growth.
In recent months the bottom has fallen out of the beef market. We used to be able to sell our day-old bull calves for a decent price. Since the price has gone we are now growing our own calves to a higher weight to market as pasture veal.
We had tried a select group a few years back, but with all things considered at that time the price was not worth the extra work.
I am lucky enough to live in an area where consumers pay a premium for unique foods. There is plenty of opportunity if you have the knowledge and are willing to expand your operation.
Jessica McIsaac milks 350 pedigree Holsteins in Petaluma, California, with her husband Neil. They sell organic milk and also have 6,000 laying hens.