Shift Mindset, Shape New Opportunities
Successful operations can rise from the ruins of the pandemic by taking advantage of opportunities.
Turn on the news recently and it can be overwhelming with bad news. Many around the country, including those in agriculture, are in survival mode. Hearing gloom and doom on the news certainly doesn’t help matters, especially when that news includes anti-ag groups taking advantage of the chaos. The world needs more good news and good deeds, says Amanda Radke, South Dakota cattle rancher and BEEF Daily blogger.
She highlights plenty of feel-good stories from social media, noting we don’t have to have all of the answers to still do good. She points to 4-H clubs and FFA chapters providing food to the hungry in their community, distilleries making hand sanitizer, cattlemen’s associations donating steak sandwiches to hospital workers, a young boy using his 3D printer to create masks for hospital workers, and more. However, she notes that nice deeds on social media don’t pay the bills.
“I believe beef producers who are willing to innovate and pivot their business models in order to better connect with their customers and serve them with what they’re actually seeking to buy — those are the folks that are going to be the most successful in this industry even during the darkest of days,” she says.
At the macro level of the beef industry, cattlemen have seen a shift in the supply chain’s functionality. Packing-plant closures highlight its efficient design, but the downside is its fragility, as COVID-19 so clearly illustrates. This makes beef producers look for innovative ways to hold cattle.
It’s also a wake-up call for the food industry. On the consumer side, Radke shares data that consumers are spending 15%-25% more on groceries, and 40% are doing their shopping online with curbside pickup. Buying patterns have illustrated what products consumers feel are essential and what make them feel secure.
“It is critical to have a finger on the pulse of what consumers see as essential,” she says.
Consumers also have more questions than ever, and there is a need for real information to be shared. This is a giant opportunity for beef producers to connect with their consumers like never before, she says.
“Beef producers need to serve as a factual, transparent, calm and approachable resource for consumers who genuinely have questions about how their beef is produced and what they’re buying at the grocery store right now,” Radke advises.
Radke suggests, with the fragility of current traditional marketing avenues, now is the time to explore all marketing avenues. Small processors and individual producers are seeing a boom in demand, and that gives a premium price and connection with area consumers.
She recommends contacting your elected officials to roll back red tape hindering direct marketing and small processors.
She boiled her advice down to four key points: innovate, pivot, connect and serve.
“In the middle of difficulty lies great opportunities,” she concludes.
