MWGA Annual Convention, Information Session
Friday, December 4, 2009
LAMB MARKETING PANEL
Dr. Rodney Kott, moderator
Joel Schumacher, MSU Extension Economist
Rick Jarrett, sheep producer and member of Sweet Grass Natural Lamb
Dan Ryan, sheep producer
Arville Lammers, sheep producer
The Montana Wool Growers Association hosted a group of individuals with varied marketing experience for this year's lamb marketing panel. Rick Jarrett is a member of Sweet Grass Natural Lamb, a cooperative of sheep producers in Sweet Grass County, Montana, that markets approximately one thousand lambs per year. Dan Ryan is a sheep producer from Missoula, Montana who formerly marketed his lamb products at the Missoula farmer's market. Arville Lammers is a sheep producer who tried marketing his products locally, but unlike Ryan, did not find it profitable and returned to traditional marketing methods.
Although their experiences marketing lamb have been vastly different, the three sheep producers agreed on one key point: location is crucial to one's marketing strategy. Lammers experienced a loss of value by slaughtering locally. At the time, Lammers did not have the local demand for his products to allow him to mark up his produce for a sizeable profit. Ryan, on the other hand, found himself in the perfect location at the perfect time: Missoula, Montana at the peak of the local foods movement. Ryan found that he could sell his products with a substantial mark-up, because the demand was there for local produce. When he ran into trouble getting rid of less popular cuts of meat, he found a creative way to process and package them that appealed to his customers. Two examples Ryan provided were: saving the livers and having a processing plant make them into liverwurst toward the end of the season and saving the tongues and selling four or five in one package as a delicacy. When Ryan let Missoula, he left behind a market that demanded five to six lambs per week with a gross profit of $170 to $200 per lamb. The expense of distribution was Ryan's biggest obstacle. When he moved away from Missoula, the travel costs made continuing in that market impractical.
Jarrett agreed that marketing is the hardest part of production and asked the audience for advice, "What we all lack is expertise and if you can offer us some expertise, it would be a real help." Ryan commented that he had found the American Lamb Board's publications extremely helpful for marketing his produce and advised anyone trying to sell at local markets to offer customers ALB recipe books and promotional materials.
Joel Schumacher summarized the panel's comments by highlighting three key points: accessibility and distance to market and slaughter are crucial to the net income for producers marketing directly to customers; the inconsistency among popularity of meat cuts makes meeting demand difficult; and the efficiency of processing individually is far lower than at slaughter plants, because pelts are difficult to market on a small scale and waste is harder to dispose of. Despite the difficulties of direct marketing, a common theme in the discussions was the need to adapt to the local foods trend developing in the United States.
Friday, December 4, 2009
LAMB MARKETING PANEL
Dr. Rodney Kott, moderator
Joel Schumacher, MSU Extension Economist
Rick Jarrett, sheep producer and member of Sweet Grass Natural Lamb
Dan Ryan, sheep producer
Arville Lammers, sheep producer
The Montana Wool Growers Association hosted a group of individuals with varied marketing experience for this year's lamb marketing panel. Rick Jarrett is a member of Sweet Grass Natural Lamb, a cooperative of sheep producers in Sweet Grass County, Montana, that markets approximately one thousand lambs per year. Dan Ryan is a sheep producer from Missoula, Montana who formerly marketed his lamb products at the Missoula farmer's market. Arville Lammers is a sheep producer who tried marketing his products locally, but unlike Ryan, did not find it profitable and returned to traditional marketing methods.
Although their experiences marketing lamb have been vastly different, the three sheep producers agreed on one key point: location is crucial to one's marketing strategy. Lammers experienced a loss of value by slaughtering locally. At the time, Lammers did not have the local demand for his products to allow him to mark up his produce for a sizeable profit. Ryan, on the other hand, found himself in the perfect location at the perfect time: Missoula, Montana at the peak of the local foods movement. Ryan found that he could sell his products with a substantial mark-up, because the demand was there for local produce. When he ran into trouble getting rid of less popular cuts of meat, he found a creative way to process and package them that appealed to his customers. Two examples Ryan provided were: saving the livers and having a processing plant make them into liverwurst toward the end of the season and saving the tongues and selling four or five in one package as a delicacy. When Ryan let Missoula, he left behind a market that demanded five to six lambs per week with a gross profit of $170 to $200 per lamb. The expense of distribution was Ryan's biggest obstacle. When he moved away from Missoula, the travel costs made continuing in that market impractical.
Jarrett agreed that marketing is the hardest part of production and asked the audience for advice, "What we all lack is expertise and if you can offer us some expertise, it would be a real help." Ryan commented that he had found the American Lamb Board's publications extremely helpful for marketing his produce and advised anyone trying to sell at local markets to offer customers ALB recipe books and promotional materials.
Joel Schumacher summarized the panel's comments by highlighting three key points: accessibility and distance to market and slaughter are crucial to the net income for producers marketing directly to customers; the inconsistency among popularity of meat cuts makes meeting demand difficult; and the efficiency of processing individually is far lower than at slaughter plants, because pelts are difficult to market on a small scale and waste is harder to dispose of. Despite the difficulties of direct marketing, a common theme in the discussions was the need to adapt to the local foods trend developing in the United States.
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