This Saturday I took a trip up to Moorefield to visit the owners of Echo Valley Ranch, Brad and Donna Martin. They specialize in raising grass-fed meat and dairy cattle and free-range chickens. Their products include grass-fed beef cuts, cowshares (for raw milk, cream, butter, yoghurt), free-range pastured chickens and their eggs. Brad showed me the operation, starting with the corralled cattle, ending with the dairy operation. The chickens come in the spring, so I didn’t see any. I ended up purchasing a cowshare and took home 4L of raw milk and 1L of cream. The milk is absolutely delicious, I can’t get enough of it. I haven’t tried the cream yet, but I have never had bad tasting cream, so I have big expectations.
I had a great conversation with Brad while driving around and we agree on pretty much everything related to nutrition, politics, and probably religion. I got in their customer list at the last minute as all new customers go on a wait list. Their regular customers will have first dibs on all their products and the people on the wait list get the rest. Based on what I saw during my visit, I would be happy to be on the wait list, so go visit their site and give them a call or email.
Pictures and video of the cows are below:
Odd they have one charolais-cross cow (looks like one anyway) in there herd. Looks totally out of place. Did they explain why? Anyway, I grew up in the cattle ranching business and at that time there seemed to little interest in grass fed beef – it all had to go to the feedlot to get it fattened up and tenderized (highly marbled was thought to be better). Well, actually, the “Natural Beef” thing was just starting. It amazes me how much grass-fed beef is fetching by the pound from the ranchers who have figured out how to market directly to the consumer. I think people who want grass fed should start talking to regular ranchers, buy a critter, call the mobile slaughter guy, and have it butchered. I do not know why that would not work, and it bet a person could save a ton of money. At any rate, there seems to be a huge demand for natural grass fed beef, and that is a great thing. My family used to sell farm raised eggs (the “pastured” kind) and milk from our cow. We always were expected to take less money than the stores got, because it was directly from the farm – no middle man to pay etc. Times have certainly changed!
I guess it depends what you find expensive. Paying $3.50/lb hanging weight for a product that you know is safe is quite affordable for many people. It could even come close to competing with supermarket prices. I personally prefer to do this kinda business at the personal level because it expands my personal network and it creates opportunities that may not exist if I deal with larger operators. I don’t mind if the farmers make big profits either because that means the business is sustainable and more people would start ranching. Which would bring prices down.
Thanks for your comments by the way, it’s neat to talk to someone who has hands-on experience.
I guess the point of my argument is that there are many grass fed cattle ranchers out there who think their only option for marketing their livestock is to sell to some cattle buyer who then sells to some big feedlot operator. The rancher could be selling to the consumer and making a better profit if the rancher and consumer can find each other and the rancher can realize the benefits of such a deal (i.e. more profit and more humane treatment of livestock). One of the drawbacks would be having to deal with people individually with the time consumption and possible aggravation that comes with that (bad checks, unhappy customers who expect something you aren’t offering, ranch touring people who don’t buy etc.). I know as a rancher I would deal with that to build my business, my father not so much. Yes, the consumer would have to pay more for the beef than the cattle buyer to make up for those drawbacks. However, I’m not sure how much more if the practice was more widespread.
It’s a great feeling knowing exactly where your food comes from, and having conversations with the people who grow it for you. There’s also peace of mind that you’ll have food available when resources become scarce. For the environmentalists, there is minimal damage to an ecosystem if livestock is raised as close to nature as possible.
There may be aggravation for the rancher, but the people I’m dealing with are currently not taking any new customers because they can’t keep up with demand and don’t want to grow beyond their current size. I think there’s a lot of reward for such a rancher as they see their efforts pay off pretty quickly and establishing long-lasting relationships with their customers, always knowing that these people will buy their products.
As more ranchers operate this way they will realize that there is little need to take out loans and mortgages to farm (as long as they have the land). Ranchers and farmers are probably the most indebted business people out there, because modern agriculture “requires” a huge amount of automation and lots of heavy machinery. More of them need to remember the KISS rule.
I think what these ranchers are doing is wonderful. The “aggravation” factor would depend upon the kind of person the rancher is. It’s been said in my family that we weren’t ranching for the money, we did it for the lifestyle – it was a way of life. The last thing my father would want to do in that lifestyle is deal with a bunch of “city slickers” concerned about their health or how we operated our ranch or treated our cows. Don’t get me wrong, you would probably be impressed with our operation. We used no chemicals, no fertilizers, no hormones, no antibiotics except for illness. We did not buy much machinery – only what it took to make and feed hay for the cows and nothing big and fancy. We never had much money anyway. My Dad was the old fashioned cowboy – he fed the cows with horse drawn wagons until the mid sixties – no one was doing that then. He did not want to learn about new methods or ways to increase production. (Mostly because all that costs money). He was an extremely hard worker, and the year was successful if we could pay the bank back when we sold our calves to the cattle buyer. We had a VERY Good Year if we had enough money left over to not have to borrow any for a few months or we could use it to buy a tractor or other equipment we needed. Ranching is tough, you have to fight the weather, deal with sickness and disease, poor markets. broke down equipment, fencing. It was a very hard life, but it holds my fondest memories.
It does sound wonderful. The people I’m dealing with are probably in the same boat. I was wondering, do you think they’d be open to letting me go help out with chores? That’s something I’d be interested in doing, but I’m not sure if they’d welcome the help or consider it a burden.
If it were my ranch, the only problem I would have is if you would be some kind of liability risk should you get hurt. We had liability coverage on our ranch, but I’m not sure how it works for free labor from “friends.” Could be you would need workman’s comp coverage or something. Or maybe these people would welcome you without a second thought I would like to join you too. I would love to get back to the farm.
I’ll ask next time I see them. I don’t think you can join me though, unless you telecommute from Oregon