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Promoting the Future of Farming through Humble Exchanges with Russ Conser from Grassfed Exchange
152 Plays4 years ago
In this episode of the Direct Farm Podcast, we're delighted to host Russ Conser from Grassfed Exchange. Listen as Russ shares how he got involved with the Grassfed Exchange and how its members are currently having exchanges and learning to improve their farms.
Show Notes:
https://grassfedexchange.com/
https://www.barn2door.com/resources
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Farm Success Through Four Levers
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to the Direct Farm podcast, the weekly listen for farm selling direct. We'll talk about the four levers for farm success, which are quality, brand, price, and convenience. We'll hear from outside industry experts and producers like you to delight your customers, save time and to increase your direct farm sales and business. We're glad you're here.
00:00:26
Speaker
Welcome to the Direct Farm podcast.
Meet Russ Conzer and the Grass Fed Exchange
00:00:28
Speaker
We've got a terrific conversation for you today with the Grass Fed Exchange. I am delighted to welcome Russ Conzer, the president for the Grass Fed Exchange. Welcome Russ. Hi Alyssa, thanks for having me on. Thank you so much for being here. So I guess to get things started, tell us a little bit more about the history of the Grass Fed Exchange.
00:00:50
Speaker
Yeah, the grass fed exchange started as a group of farmers and producers in what was then this unusual fringe sector of grass fed meat production who decided they need to get together to talk about everything from grazing practices to genetics, to marketing. And they literally came together in a barn in Nebraska. That conference grew, it's now 12 years old, community of people in physical attendance at an annual conference of about 500 people for the next event.
00:01:19
Speaker
that we'll be doing in Dallas. We've got a larger facility that will let us get to 700, but we routinely engage with about 4,000 American farmers, producers, marketers, people in the grass-fed industry.
00:01:31
Speaker
I said Dallas, I should say Fort Worth. Don't take offense. Dallas to Will Rogers Center in Fort Worth. It's just wonderful. It's almost like, you know, coming home to Cowtown here in Texas. I'm just outside of Houston, right? With, you know, which is legendary. Fort Worth is legendary in the cattle industry where cattle and all kinds of livestock are a part of a system that can help do good things for the world. So we're excited about looking forward
Mission and Impact of the Grass Fed Exchange
00:01:54
Speaker
to that. Even though it's a year away, it was supposed to be a year ago, of course, COVID.
00:01:57
Speaker
kick that down the road. But yeah, and it's all about, I mean, our role in life is to, we state our mission is to humbly exchange the knowledge of the gifts we are given to reawaken the health of the people in the land. We're primarily a how-to organization, so this isn't a big theoretical exercise in people and why they ought to get go grass fed or why they ought to get into regenerative
00:02:21
Speaker
It's all about how and it's all about farmer to farmer education and other people in supply chain marketers, distributors, processors, et cetera. So yeah, it's farmer started, farmer grown and other players that come together in that industry to compare notes and figure out how to do better.
Russ Conzer's Journey into Agriculture
00:02:40
Speaker
That's great. Tell us a little bit more about the mission you mentioned, you know, giving back to the land, the animals, it starts with the producers, it starts with the farmers. So tell us about that mission and the vision behind the grass fed exchange, as well as, I believe you're also the CEO of blueness beef. So on a personal level, what does this organization mean to you?
00:03:02
Speaker
Wow, it's honestly where a key part of where my journey started anyway, so maybe I'll go there second because it may be a little bit of a rabbit hole but the first part of that mission statement right to humbly exchange knowledge, it really contains the idea that I have knowledge I have skills, but there's things I don't know. So I'm humble so I want to learn from somebody else.
00:03:22
Speaker
And so one of the things that's absolutely true about the grassroots exchange and our mission here is a willingness and a receptiveness to share what you think you know, but be willing to learn from somebody else all the time, a really giving and sharing environment. We've really expanded that quite a bit to be able to incorporate people of all ages. So it's really fun to watch.
00:03:40
Speaker
young people engage with people have been doing it for a while and learn something like profound. And likewise, the other way around, people that have been seasoned farmers in the space, learning from great questions and insights that young innovative farmers and producers are doing. The second part of that mission statement, which is to awaken the health of both land and people is a recognition, right? Intimately connected. I guess I'll avoid the really big rabbit hole here, but I think if there's one way to characterize what's gone wrong in the last
00:04:09
Speaker
500 years, if not 10,000 years is that we unwittingly adopted an assumption that separated us as humans from the natural systems that we're a part of.
Regenerative Practices and Soil Building
00:04:20
Speaker
There's this big divide. And I think one of the things that all regenerative producers come to recognize is that the health of land and people are intrinsically connected.
00:04:29
Speaker
They're literally grounded in soil. And so the whole industry has moved from this appreciation. I think in the proto grass-fed industry 10 or 20 years ago, you would have found that the conversation started among people like, OK, I'm not a cattle farmer. I'm a grass farmer. But I think today, you'll find that most people realize they're actually soil builders and that the cattle and the grass and all the other parts of an ecosystem are part of making that happen.
00:04:59
Speaker
In recognition of that, the product from that has to flow through a viable supply chain of processors and marketers and distributors. They get that healthy product all the way to the consumer's plate in a way that the consumer values it, appreciates it, can get it when they want it, right? Huge problem and opportunity. And so really what we try to be as a grass-fed exchange is a place where everybody can get together, you know, see old friends like you can at any
00:05:23
Speaker
Conference meet many new ones, but then learn from each other on how to kind of make that whole system work. We really do think that the only future for farming in America or anywhere in the world is regenerative in the long run. And the only way we're going to get there is by comparing notes farmer to farmer.
00:05:42
Speaker
actor to actor in that system to get there. Now in terms of my own role or my own kind of history, I had nothing to do with agriculture eight years ago and I happened to be there when Alan Savory gave his famous talk at TED that really catalyzed a lot of people and found it very intriguing but it wasn't until some further serendipity fell into place
00:06:05
Speaker
a few weeks later that caused me to really look into this question, you know, I'm an engineer and a scientist by background. And so for me, I was already on the kind of the grass fed
00:06:17
Speaker
trained for health benefits early on. But what really intrigued me about the space were the potential solutions for climate change and environmental problems. And serendipity led me to meet my now wonderful friend, Peter Bick. Many people know him as a movie producer, the Soul Carbon Cowboys videos that people see. And so I got on the phone because somebody encouraged me to meet this crazy Peter Bick guy.
00:06:41
Speaker
And Peter just kept twisting my arm. Rush, you need to come to the grass fed exchange. Rush, you need to come to the grass fed exchange. He wouldn't let up. And that was in 2013 when the grass fed exchange was being held in Bismarck, North Dakota. And so I flew all the way from Houston to Bismarck, North Dakota. I'd never been up there before and just thought this was the most amazing thing ever. That these farmers, not only could I see with my own eyes,
00:07:03
Speaker
There's magic that would happen in ecosystems when farmers produce differently. But what I saw was just this incredible open, welcoming spirit in the community of farmers where they were learning and sharing with one another. As an engineer by background, pragmatism is what wins. I care about things that work. And what I saw was farmers and ranchers, they're just making stuff work. They're working hard every day to learn.
00:07:25
Speaker
And they're doing amazing things.
Evolving Role in Grass Fed Exchange and Blue Nest Beef
00:07:27
Speaker
And so literally, I had already made the decision, oh, I'm coming back next year. I have nothing to do with this industry, but these people are awesome. And I was already all signed up to attend in 2014 when it was in Missouri. And then the keynote speaker, Fred Provenza, became ill and they called and said, hey Russ, you want to give a keynote talk about soil carbon?
00:07:46
Speaker
And so suddenly I was a speaker at an event I was just planning to go to to attend. And that just made me much more deeply connected to this community. They asked me to join up and be a part of their community. And I guess the rest is history. So even things like this blue nest beef, I mean, it's kind of what can I do for it? I continue to be very involved in the science, but the commercial side of me is what can I do to help get the industry moving in the direction by bridging the gap with consumers.
00:08:14
Speaker
Yeah, that's great to hear that it started as a passion project of something you're curious about and interested in because I think when you're confronted a problem, sometimes it starts with, I'm curious about this. How can we fix this? How can we solve this? And then having that community build around that common problem and working together and
00:08:32
Speaker
figuring out a way to adapt and to evolve. So how would you say that the organization, the grass-fed exchange, has evolved over the years, started as a conference, but now looking ahead in 2021, almost midway through the year, how has the organization evolved going into the future?
00:08:49
Speaker
Well, one of the first things I'd say important that's proudly already in our most recent history is we've greatly expanded the diversity and age and location and participation of everything you think of in the demographics. So really when the grass-fed exchange started, it was.
00:09:06
Speaker
dominated by seasoned farmers that were just trying to make ends meet, make something work, and only through the gracious support of other partners, did we start really going out and targeting bringing young people into this solution, and it fundamentally transformed the organization into a place where
00:09:22
Speaker
now we've got, you know, it's fun when you have little kids running around under your feet at a conference, you know, and people holding their babies because they're welcome. It's multi-generational and that's, you know, incredibly exciting. It was also important for the grass-fed exchange in a recent past. That first trip to Bismarck, North Dakota coming up on eight years ago now was like a big step for grass-fed exchange. You know, should we just be like a little local event that people come to or
00:09:47
Speaker
Should we try to get out and move around? And it was such a success that the Grass Fed Exchange has now been around every corner of the country, or not every corner, but many corners of the country. Georgia, New York, last year we were in California, came back to South Dakota. We're in Texas this year. I'm really proud that we're going to be in Texas. The following year, we're planning to go to Canada, so to be truly international, a small step international.
Adapting to Virtual Events and Community Building
00:10:12
Speaker
We're planning to be in Calgary. And where we go, I think is kind of a, we're beginning the phases now of virtualization of this community. It's a great tribe flock network of folks that have come to know each other that it, you know, has this welcoming sharing attitude, like many people significantly set back by COVID and the difficulties in getting together face to face. So recently we've started monthly virtual events.
00:10:39
Speaker
here where we call them the hallway conversations. You know, it's kind of like the B tracks, I guess, of a recording studio type stuff. But when we, when we talked about it as a board, we recognize that the thing we missed about the conference wasn't the PowerPoints. It was the opportunity to compare notes with other like-minded and curious people in the hallways between those big talks. And so we decided to focus our energy until we can get together again.
00:11:08
Speaker
on taking one topic a month, getting a couple of interesting people to just start a conversation and then inviting a larger community to be a part of it. So, you know, as a grass-fed exchange, we're always looking to try to have conversations. Again, it's exchange of knowledge. We're not trying to preach or pass along something that's in a textbook. We're exploring the space together. So we're very happy to wrestle with difficult issues for which there are no immediate answers, but you got knowledgeable people sharing what they know.
00:11:35
Speaker
So we've done panels so far on things like processing, on family transitions, on diversity. This month, we'll be running one on carbon markets. That's kind of a big thing now that a lot of people are talking about. Is this something that's interesting to ranchers and how it will work? So that's been a big hit. And we hope to do more of that. Where that takes us is a grass-fed exchange. Not completely clear yet, but if we can be a network of people that can be there to humbly exchange knowledge,
00:12:04
Speaker
to help awaken the health of Landon people wherever people are, whenever people are. We're not wedded to the conference itself as the form we need to be, and we love it. It's always great to get together with friends, and I'm sure like every event, it's gonna be more special than ever when we get to get back together again, right?
Pandemic's Impact on the Meat Industry
00:12:23
Speaker
The important part is we're all living still amongst broken land. I mean, the world got to see
00:12:31
Speaker
the broken meat and livestock industry last year, right? When COVID hit early, right? And all the big meat packing and processing plants started falling apart. People started looking around, where am I going to get my family's food? And I think, you know, it's not like the world's going to change overnight, but I think it opens some eyes and it's kind of helping move the ball in the right direction. So exciting times. And, you know, we are humbly proud if that kind of paradox can exist together.
00:12:56
Speaker
that we can be a part of it. I think it's it's so important and I love how you how you touch on the common thread throughout your organization throughout the years of exchanging information being able to learn to be able to teach and to learn from each other
00:13:12
Speaker
So what would you say are some of the most beneficial aspects of being a part of this community? You touched on the education component to it. I understand that you also support regenerative ranchers and you also support or have people involved from the grassroot industry who are just supporters too. So what are some of those beneficial aspects from the farmer side or the rancher side?
00:13:33
Speaker
Well, I think the big beneficial aspect of the farmers, whether it's at the event or between the events or in virtual events or whatever the case may be, is the opportunity to plug into this network of knowledge exchange that is truly humble.
00:13:49
Speaker
what I've seen is lives transformed and not because somebody watched Gabe Brown on a YouTube video but because they met Gabe Brown and when they had a question they called him up and Gabe answered the question. Now I hope Gabe's phone doesn't start ringing off the hook but you know that Gabe Brown quality of people whether they're young or old or they've ever been on a video or anything before they're all over the country. I mean we have amazing regenerative producers families
00:14:13
Speaker
young and old that are out there figuring out how to make, you know, grow grass that grows healthy soil and grow healthy meat everywhere in the country. And the opportunity to pick up the phone or text message or email someone you met or talked to or saw. What's really awesome about this community is it's just so giving. People are routinely reaching out to each other and getting plugged into people who are willing to help. And, you know, I'm just a cog in the wheel, kind of an error to
00:14:42
Speaker
You know, all the hard work that the many pioneers who built this organization have created. And I'm sure that many of them come afterwards, but that the power isn't in us as a board or officers at all. It's, it's all in that kind of farmer to farmer interaction all the time. The power of the organization is that ethos and culture of that community that's willing to share.
00:15:02
Speaker
And I think between those hallway conversations, as well as the conference itself, you're giving people that opportunity to interact and engage and learn from one another as well. So for looking at the conference through that lens, I know you hold that conference annually every year. What would you say is maybe a point for those looking to attend? What can they expect from attending the conference? The important thing to understand is that it's a how-to
Grass Fed Exchange Conference Highlights
00:15:27
Speaker
conference. That's how I like to describe it. So yes, you can come and get inspired.
00:15:32
Speaker
But hopefully you're inspired because you find people that are actually getting stuff done and you know you can learn about how to get whatever it is done you need to get done done. That sounded kind of weird but because it's a how-to conference it's broken up into three primary parts. It's a three-day event. The first day is all field tours. In Texas this year we have five field tours or next year
00:15:54
Speaker
We have five field tours set up to basically head to several different points of the compass that will visit multiple farms that are either pioneers or working hard on different dimensions, whether it's amazing grazing at Birdwell Clark. You haven't seen anything until you've seen a herd of 5,000 cattle pick up and move four times a day all at once. It's like watching a feedlot get up and relocate itself, right?
00:16:19
Speaker
It's like the super tanker of rotational grazing. Or you can go up to the Noble Research Ranch and learn about some of the interesting science that they're doing with grazing and cattle or genetics. It's picking apart different types of things. John and Wendy Taggart at Burgundy Beef, some of the early pioneers in grass-fed beef right here in Texas, just south of Fort Worth.
00:16:44
Speaker
They've been running the full farm system for a while, finishing your own cattle, processing. They have their own butcher shops and online retail. People want to learn about that marketing. They can come learn about that. Instead of learning about it in a PowerPoint presentation, you're going to go spend the day with John and Wendy. It's that richness of hands-on learning that's important on that first day.
00:17:06
Speaker
The second day is more of what you'd expect with features, speakers, usually in depth. Our talks are typically about an hour, but a lot of good break time. So hour-long breaks with a large exhibit floor. This year we'll even have some interesting things going on, like a demonstration of butchery. So people can come in and see how
00:17:25
Speaker
you know, how you might be able to market some different cuts of meats to animals and learn what it takes to do that. So and it's going to be fun for the upcoming one instead of doing what we usually do, which is kind of a big evening kind of interesting, provocative talk where we're holding a good Texas barbecue and folk dance. So what we call the regeneration celebration. So you can expect to come and have fun. And then on that last day,
00:17:53
Speaker
day three, it's all about smaller group, topical breakout sessions, mostly a little bit of presentation, but a lot of conversation in those things. So take a topic, invite two or three people to give some introductory comments and then start a dialogue in that group. So whether that's challenges in grazing management in different environments or how to market your beef or
00:18:18
Speaker
how to deal with land and family transitions over generations. These kinds of topics are things that, you know, we can get those deeper practical dives into that kind of three part event in field tours that are with people that are doing real stuff. Big inspirational talks with great breakout sessions or great breaks to talk and meet people and learn things. And then good breakout sessions on the third day to go in depth in areas that you're particularly interested in. I think we're all humbly learning.
00:18:48
Speaker
at this point in this space, very excited about what we see. Personally, the farm tours are to me always fun. There's just nothing like seeing farms in completely different parts of the country applying the same principles, but in very, very different ways.
00:19:06
Speaker
You know, getting exciting results and, you know, learning, learning things, you know, part of that knowledge exchange isn't just like knowledge that works. It's like, I did this and it didn't work. And I lost my butt and here's how we survived it or whatever. It is not at all uncommon at the grass fed exchange to hear someone tell you their story of what went wrong. And again, that's a part of that humble exchange.
00:19:29
Speaker
Yeah, I love how you present the information too in different ways. So you have those breakout groups, you go on the farm tour, you also have those keynotes and presentations because people absorb information in different ways and being able to have that hands-on experience to go do what they're going to do on their farm as well. And then with that theme, tell us a little bit more about the theme for your event, which is rooted in wisdom. What was the decision to have this conference rooted in wisdom?
00:19:57
Speaker
You've been paying attention because we just came up with that a couple of weeks ago and we're very excited about it. I mean, we felt our previously planned event for Fort Worth was called Sheared Stewardship. That felt really good at the time and COVID kind of changed everything. And we had a really good conversation of a board of, you know, what's the meaningful conversation we need to have now? Wisdom is one of those really powerful words, right? That allows us to connect to knowledge in whatever form it may be.
00:20:26
Speaker
It may be the wisdom of the land itself, but it may be the wisdom of different peoples. You know, I'm particularly fascinated here in Texas with the wisdom of indigenous peoples that came before us.
00:20:38
Speaker
So I think you can expect to hear that kind of stuff, but it could be, you know, your own grandma's wisdom or some other cultural wisdom. We think that that, you know, I like my friend Fred Provenza, happens to be the guy that I stood in for there. The Grasshoi Exchange in 2014 likes to call rediscovering our nutritional wisdom, I think is the subtitle of his book, Nourishment. I don't know if you've
00:21:01
Speaker
read that great book. And he uses this phrase, wisdom of the body, right, which is a key path to health, is learning that your body is trying to be healthy. And how do you help it get there? Well, it's true in the pasture as well. It's true in the land, right? And so, of course, roots is a great word for anything to do with agriculture, especially if you're in the pasture business.
00:21:22
Speaker
So yeah, we're pretty excited about Rooted and Wisdom. We're literally just starting to shape our agenda now for the big talks and breakouts. And we'll probably be announcing that in a couple months. That's exciting. In one year's time, right? May 18th, I believe is the first day. May 18th of 2022. So yeah, just a little over a year from now. And that should really be.
00:21:43
Speaker
One of the things we try to do with our conference is time it to really get the most out of those tours. And mid-May and north central Texas, you know, the grass is really rocking. You know, it's getting warm, but it's not hot. And, you know, these tours that we have will allow people to explore and see, you know, some really interesting things in the field. You know, you can do an indoor conference any time of year, but it's those tours that really kind of, you know,
00:22:10
Speaker
wet up with the calendar of the sunshine. So far we've been blessed with those tours. One of the things that is fun with farmers is they're not afraid of rain either and they're not afraid to get mud on their boots if that's what it is. We had some pretty massive rainstorms in South Dakota a couple years ago and we had to call a couple audibles on tours but we did them.
00:22:31
Speaker
And we have a blast doing them. It'll be seared in my memory for a lifetime. The day we visited the 777 Bison Ranch in South Dakota on a rainy day and watching the herd of bison go up the hills and down the other side. And in this case, it literally was the ranch that Dances with Wolves was filmed at. So I mean, it's just amazing to see ecosystems function in ways that I think we take for granted. Back at the first time, I always take my wife
00:22:56
Speaker
with me and we went to the grass-fed exchange in Missouri and at first moment we set foot on the pasture and she grew up on a farm here in Texas it's like oh my gosh it's different right you know it's full of insects and butterflies and look at all the bees and the birds are singing you know it's a completely different world than industrialized farmland which is you know pretty much dominates the landscape everywhere so you know it's an inspiring community to be a part of it's a humbling community to be a part of and it's a privilege to be a part of it
00:23:26
Speaker
That's terrific.
Supporting Young Farmers Through Scholarships
00:23:27
Speaker
And I understand that you also have, or at least last year, you implement the Hurd Fellow Scholarship Program? Yep. That's what I was referring to earlier when I brought young people in. A group of philanthropists that called themselves the Hurd said, we really think the big issue is transferring knowledge to the next generation of farmers. This would have been 2015, 2016, somewhere in there.
00:23:49
Speaker
And we said, well, why don't we work together? Because we got a bunch of old farmers here. Let's work together to bring some young farmers in to meet the old farmers. And they'll probably both enjoy it. And it's such a huge hit that I think I still remember the day in 2016 in Georgia when we had the first class of herd fellows. These are people whose opportunity to attend this conference has been funded by donors. And it was really kind of on a whim
00:24:17
Speaker
I think we had something like 30 herd fellows in the room at lunch. Come on, stand up. We're going to have you all introduce yourselves.
00:24:25
Speaker
And it was almost palpable. I could see tears in the eyes of our farmers because for the first time they saw hope in the future of farming. They could see that the painful story of agriculture is family after family that's watched the next generation grow up, moved to town and not become interested in keeping the traditions of farming alive and going. And what we're seeing, I think all across America now
00:24:52
Speaker
is an interest and an appetite in a new generation. Some have their roots in farming, some don't. I'm always blown away by the story of the city girl or the city kid that, you know, had nothing to do with farming, but jumped into it. One of our board members, Sarah Gleason, now is a bison rancher in Colorado, and she was a marketer working in Washington DC. It's just crazy when you see people find their passion, find their path,
00:25:21
Speaker
And importantly, you know, grass-fit exchange isn't alone. We're really proud of what we do here, but, you know, we're an opportunity where people can plug into other people to learn from. If this is what you feel called to do, what you want to do, what you're passionate about, you can come to the grass-fit exchange and feel welcome and you want to get your boots dirty.
00:25:39
Speaker
and learn, then you're very likely to meet someone that can help you and possibly become your best friend. Everybody is in a space that's just so willing to give. And for us, our role is just to get them connected and stand back.
00:25:53
Speaker
Yeah. That's great to hear that, you know, passing it on to the next generation is, you know, top of mind because like you said, you know, farmers as they retire out or, you know, if they're, you know, have a family farm, but maybe they're trying to figure out, you know, if their, their kids are interested in taking over the family farm, being able to educate and give resources around that as well. So how can listeners support the grass fed exchange? And what did that be through the herd fellow program or possibly another program?
00:26:21
Speaker
People can absolutely if people are interested in donating the herd fellowship program they can certainly drop an email to us at info at grasswood exchange.com, and we'd be happy to chat with you participate in one of our virtual hallway conversations which we do by zoom and Facebook lives so we tried to make that really easy, you don't have to register anything if you just go to the grasswood exchange Facebook page on.
00:26:41
Speaker
When the event goes live, we can participate in that conversation and start, you know, put it on your calendar now, be in Fort Worth on May 18th through the 20th of 2022 and prepare to meet some interesting people and compare notes and learn. It's really farmer to farmer and other kind of people that are playing in the sector, but.
00:27:00
Speaker
There are people that come just to be a part of this amazing community. I know that's exactly how I came into it. That's exciting. And thinking from all the community that you have, you're able to support them through the conference, through those hallway conversations, through the farm tours. What about throughout the remainder of the year? You mentioned how there's mentorship opportunities, how organically they just happened.
00:27:21
Speaker
We're an all-volunteer organization, so we don't have a lot of resources ourselves. We try to keep the event itself very, very affordable to the farmers. That's just really fundamental to me. This is not an event where you should feel like you have to be wealthy to participate. And so we're appreciative of sponsors like you at Barn to Door that help through your sponsorship to support this thing.
00:27:44
Speaker
So we welcome sponsors to help defray those costs, to keep them down for farmers. I would like to think that someday we can grow big enough and have enough sponsors and activity that, you know, we could become a standing organization that we could actually have some paid staff to kind of keep the machine going.
Future of Food Systems and Online Markets
00:27:59
Speaker
Then we could start building knowledge infrastructure and things like that that can be more effective. Over time right now, it's that organic sharing mostly between people that makes the machine work for now. You know, even with that organic stuff, you know, we've talked several times about doing various other types of virtual.
00:28:14
Speaker
The forums even tried a few things, but there's just nothing like texting back and forth with friends or wrestling with similar problems to learn, right? So that very one-to-one relationship that's this web of network that forums is to me, the real power. Some of these big things that you'll hear at a regenerative event like the grass fed exchanges, you know, the world is completely different.
00:28:35
Speaker
where instead of waking up in the morning and trying to figure out what you need to kill today that wants to grow like a weed, how do you help what wants to live live? It's a completely different mentality for people. And I think it's fundamental to the prosperity of the health of our economy, the planet, of people, of everything. So I hope that some of that stays with us on the other side.
00:28:55
Speaker
I will settle for an increased appreciation of consumers who know their farmer, who know where their food comes from, who knows that food can be produced in a way that does good things or bad things for the environment, and that they vote with their pocketbook to be a part of the farm system that's doing good things for the world. And I think there's going to be some stickiness to it for sure. I think people are way more comfortable today with clicking on a button on a desktop or a phone and seeing a magic box of food show up on the doorstep.
00:29:24
Speaker
It's got to be good for a lot of the farmers that barn to door. I think to your point, there's always something you can learn. You haven't ever fully arrived to understand this is how I approach farming because it can change and trying to be innovative and getting ahead of it as well. What about the farmers who transition their business online as their pivot strategy? What have you noticed have been some of those effective tactics that they've implemented to bring their business online, direct to market?
00:29:50
Speaker
Yeah, I think most of the people that were online have done well and those that got online, you know, did pretty well as well. I think everyone's learning how to make that stuff work. It can be from managing inventory to setting prices to, you know, figuring out the processor and customer service. And it sure sounds easier to ship until you have to do it. So there's a whole new angle to this stuff. I think the online opportunities for farmers are a real plus and they've expanded greatly over the course of the last year.
00:30:19
Speaker
And, you know, I'm sure that's not without turmoil and trouble in some places and not in others like any other startup system. But I think that the moved online is here to stay. I think that's one of the really positive things that y'all at Barn to Door are really doing is how do we make this so we don't have to start from scratch every time. It's just, we got to figure out how to bring scale to the operations as well as scales and knowledge and making this stuff work. So, but I think more and more people are figuring out how to do that and feel pretty good about it.
00:30:48
Speaker
So I think sometimes we talk about convenience either just for the buyer or just for the farmer, but really convenience for both. Is this an option that is going to save me time and money as a farmer and a producer, but also provide convenient options for my buyers because they both have to go inside for it to be, like you mentioned, worthwhile for that business to go that route.
00:31:09
Speaker
Yeah, literally when I came back from that first grass-fed exchange, and I was like, oh man, how am I going to go find a farmer that I can have confidence in to buy my family's food from? Because I just really wanted to do something other than buy that thing that was labeled grass-fed at the grocery store. And it was hard. It was really hard. And it wasn't until I met some people, honestly, through the grass-fed exchange that I solved that problem. But who's going to do that? I'm such a weird and unusual guy. I'm like the only guy in the history
00:31:37
Speaker
that had nothing to do with the industry that flew from Houston to Bismarck to meet a bunch of farmers because there might be something interesting about climate change and soil carbon involved. So that's a totally unscalable model, right? My own route is unscalable, but I think the opportunities that companies like yours are bringing to this where you can kind of marry that, make it easier for the farmer and make it easier for the consumers at the same time is really awesome.
00:32:03
Speaker
Well, looking ahead, I know a lot of these farmers, these ranchers are in their busy season. So transitioning or pivoting a little bit, what advice are you giving to some of the farmers and ranchers in your community, knowing that there are unknowns into the future with respect to potential crops to market?
00:32:20
Speaker
That's a part of the genius of the grassroots exchange. We don't give advice to anybody. In fact, we'll even get requests from time to time, you know, give us your opinion, give us your advice on that. But that's not what we're here for. Even on political issues, what we want to be here is to be a forum where we can exchange knowledge. So I had somebody reach out to me the other day that was a grass fed producer here.
00:32:38
Speaker
North of Houston that knew a friend and said, hey, I'm struggling with some stuff. What can I do about that? Here, I'm trying to learn this stuff and figure out where to go. Well, I was able to very quickly hook him up with another farmer that's not too far from where he was. And I think by now they've struck up a conversation and they carry it on. So the advice, the insight doesn't come from any one of us. It comes from each of us to all of us given a different setting.
00:33:06
Speaker
You know, all because I have a background in science and engineering, the kind of advice that people call me for on science and technology and soil carbon and measuring scientific stuff and all that kind of thing. But, you know, it's this richness of the network where advice and insight can flow freely between people who are willing givers and humble receivers.
00:33:26
Speaker
That's what we're here for. And anything we can do as a grass-fed exchange to kind of explicitly set up a forum to have a conversation. Like I said, the next conversation we'll be doing here on carbon markets, you know, people may want to answer. What we're going to do is have a conversation that allows them to hear some people who are wrestling with these issues talk about it. And then they make up their own decisions. Well, that made sense. I like what he or she was saying.
00:33:50
Speaker
You know, give them a call. I should learn more about that or I'll look into this. And to me, that's what the grass-fed exchange is about. There's no book on that bookshelf that has the answers or the recipe and how it go about this. But somewhere out there in our community is someone who either knows the answer or is working towards it that is willing to share. And that's what we try to focus on.
00:34:12
Speaker
I also think from a brainstorming standpoint as well, when you have more people involved in that forum where it's safe to exchange ideas and thoughts and creativity is fostered in that type of environment as well. Completely. I think creating a safe place where both crazy ideas and past failures can be shared and celebrated is fundamental to creativity. My background
00:34:39
Speaker
actually is in large corporation innovation and I used to run a large international program of investing in people with just out of the box super crazy energy technology ideas.
00:34:53
Speaker
And this is such an important part. You have to create an open sharing space where people can entertain, play with, explore, try, fail, try again. That's how change happens. It doesn't happen because somebody read the magic solution for the future in a book.
00:35:12
Speaker
and implemented it and boom bang you know it was successful it's just not how success happens success is hard work it's trying it's failing it's learning it's trying something different and then you know finally it comes together so you know we're all on a journey in our lives and you know i think grassroots change is really just an embodiment of that
00:35:31
Speaker
Well said. Before we sign off, is there, I guess I would say on the personal side then, from your science background, you have background with innovation and businesses. Do you have any advice that you would want to share with farmers? Yeah. The magic is always in what you think you know that isn't so, as they say, right? One of the things I've absolutely learned in breakthrough science and engineering and technology is
00:35:56
Speaker
is that it's very often the hidden assumptions in what we think is...
00:36:02
Speaker
necessarily true or practically true or always the way we've done it, because whatever that is, there's hidden assumptions in there. And the future is contained in some new idea that violates the assumption that you didn't even know was there. So that willingness to realize, and this is where humility becomes so important, right? To realize, none of us knows as much as we might like to pretend we know.
00:36:28
Speaker
that helps keep us open to learning from others, to trying things new. And then it also, I think, helps protect us from that. Like, okay, well, I tried that, it didn't work. One of the beautiful things about regenerative grazing is that every day is a new experiment. The sun comes up, the sun goes down. You can try something, and if it works, great, do it again tomorrow. So what's incredibly inspiring about these regenerative producers
00:36:56
Speaker
around America and even all around the world now is that they're just people that have gone out there with a willingness to try.
00:37:06
Speaker
And they didn't hold themselves back. They didn't use an excuse that, well, that's the way my daddy did it. That's the way it's always been done. That's the way we know for sure it works. Whatever those excuses are, we have to learn how to look through, look past, even intentionally. In my corporate world, I used to tell my bosses, I know this is gonna sound funny. For 95% of the stuff you do,
00:37:34
Speaker
there's brilliance already in the way it's done, and you should keep doing it that way. But if you're looking for the 5% that holds the keys to doing something fundamentally new that you could do, that could be really important, do the opposite of what you think you should do. If your intuition says, go right, try left, and it's only in that trying left
00:37:56
Speaker
that you will have an opportunity to learn something. Yeah, left is a really bad idea. Maybe nine times out of 10, left is really bad, but one time out of 10, left opened a pathway to something new. It's the whole Robert Frost, the road less traveled thing, right?
00:38:13
Speaker
I think the successful regenerative farmers are the ones that have given themselves permission to experiment in new directions. One of the fundamental things that they do to do that
00:38:27
Speaker
is they don't get arrogant, overconfident, anything about predicting what that outcome of any given decision is going to be. They become not only great experimenters, but incredible observers of whatever happens from that experiment. So if you turn left and you just keep walking left and you don't pay attention to what's going on, you might fall off a cliff that's over the left-hand road, right? But the real regenerative producers that are doing amazing things in regenerative meat production
00:38:56
Speaker
are people that get up in the morning and they look at their grass, they watch the birds, they smell the soil, they appreciate the spider webs out there that they didn't know were missing before. It's that developing the power of observation is the necessary companion to the willingness to try. You put those two things together and who knows where you show up.
00:39:17
Speaker
you know, where you can get to. I would say we are so early in this new transition to regenerative agriculture that there's going to be people experimenting, trying, learning, failing, succeeding for generations. This is not something we're going to solve and implement and replicate, you know, and I can snap our magic fingers and have suddenly, you know, every acre of farm and pasture land in America produced differently. But if we get up every day and try to humbly learn, then I think, you know,
00:39:47
Speaker
By the time my grandchildren are older and younger, we will have reinvigorated our ecosystems here. So there you go. A bit philosophical, but that's how I see the world. Well, it definitely starts with mindset. You know, before you implement change, you have to just think about, you know, what are my options and thinking outside the box from there too.
00:40:06
Speaker
Yeah, it really is honestly the hardest part for many people is giving yourself permission to think outside the box because anytime you give yourself the permission to try something out of the box, you have to be willing to give yourself the permission to fail, right? If you're not willing to fail, if it doesn't go right, then
00:40:21
Speaker
You know, you better not start because you're going to fail more often than you're going to succeed early on in any of your ventures. I mean, it's good that we have a lot of people that like to repeat and replicate, you know, proven tried and true things, but the world only changes when people explore those other roads and find something new, interesting, valuable that helps us all. That's what we need to do.
00:40:43
Speaker
What's next for the grass fed exchange? I think figuring out how we're only about six months into this virtual conversation stuff and figuring out how do we build structures.
00:40:54
Speaker
that help that kind of stuff happen more easily in more places, more of the time. That may be entirely virtual. It may be more regional opportunities where farmers and ranchers can get together on a more local basis. That's probably a little bit further out. Again, we need more institutional structure to be able to do that. But I can easily see that 10 years down the road that we could have little grass-fed exchanges happening in all corners of the country.
00:41:20
Speaker
where smaller groups of farmers get together and humbly exchange knowledge on a regular basis. And then some of them come together at a national event once a year. And even more people pop in and out of virtual conversations that are happening on a more regular basis over time. So we're very much in this mode I described with trying, observing, and learning right now. So what applies to the pasture applies to our own
00:41:47
Speaker
activities and we're really encouraged with these hallway conversations and where they've started. But who knows we'll keep doing the trying and observing like I said.
00:41:57
Speaker
Well, I'm excited to hear where you guys end up and to check in with you in a year's time because I'm sure a lot will change within the year. So thank you so much Russ for joining us today. I hope you get to come to Fort Worth too and be present with us there. It should be a blast. I hope so. Yeah. And for the folks listening in, please mark your calendars for May 18th of 2022. So not 2021, May 18th through May 20th, 2022 in Fort Worth, Texas.
00:42:25
Speaker
for the grass-fed exchange conference.
00:42:28
Speaker
And I also want to extend my thanks to all the regenerative ranchers and grass-fed industry supporters who are part of the grass-fed exchange community. At Barred2Door, we are delighted to serve regenerative ranchers and farmers in all 50 states. For more information on the grass-fed exchange, you can visit their website grassfedexchange.com. And to learn more about Barred2Door, including access to numerous free resources and best practices for your farm, you can go to barred2door.com slash resources.
00:42:57
Speaker
Thank you so much for tuning in and we will see you next time. Awesome, Melissa. Thanks for having me.