The intriguing thing about the discussion following my previous post is that the discussion is taking place at all. That discussion couldn’t have taken place a year ago, when Organic Pastures was shut down (by state and federal investigators seeking a link to children’s illnesses) and Michigan authorities were in the late-planning stages for their Richard Hebron sting.
So now here we are a year later, assessing the best growth strategies for the American raw milk industry. Because, as Don Neeper says, California sets the tone for the entire country. If venture capital flows into Organic Pastures and it revs up production, well, why might there not be capital flowing into other dairies in other states? (By the way, Mark McAfee has said that he has only acquired cream from outside his dairy; no raw milk…yet from Wisconsin, as Steve Bemis speculates.)
All that being said, I share the concerns of those who worry about the potentially corrupting influence of corporate-type money on a raw-milk dairy. The industry, as it were, has only achieved the kind of credibility whereby a venture capital firm would even consider investing, based on building up sufficient confidence with growing numbers of consumers about quality and safety.
The best comparable example I can think of in terms of predicting an idealistic company’s future direction once it obtains outside capital is Whole Foods. Its predecessor in the Boston area was a chain known as Bread & Circus. When B&C (as it was known locally) grew during the late 1970s and 1980s, its offerings consisted mainly of organic vegetables and fruits, and the famous grain/nut bins. It wouldn’t stock any foods with caffeine, refined sugar, white flour, corn syrup, or artificial sweeteners, and it didn’t sell alcohol, meat or fish—all in the interests of good health.
Gradually, as it expanded throughout the Northeast in the late 1980s, the prohibitions fell (I don’t remember the exact order). By the time it was acquired by Whole Foods in 1992, it had pretty much done away with everything, except perhaps corn syrup and artificial sweeteners. According to the Whole Foods history page, it was the same story with Mrs. Gooch’s in the Los Angeles area, and presumably other retailers the Austin company acquired in its expansion kick. About the only prohibitions today at Whole Foods, from what I can see, are the artificial sweeteners and mass-market chips, sodas and diet sodas.
Yes, the produce quality and bins are still heads and tails above other chains. But you have to take nearly as much care in the center of a Whole Foods as you do in other major grocery chains. And the CEO is under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission for weird stock trading practices.
The reality for Whole Foods has been that no matter how dedicated the founders, the pressure has been on from investors to “expand the market” by offering more products and more convenience. Consumers want choices and discounted pricing. Applying that progression to raw milk, it wouldn’t surprise me if, going down the road, we see similar merchandising and corner cutting–say “pasteurized light” or “partially pasture-fed” or "acidopholus added." You know the accountants will do cost analyses to determine how far they can go in supplementing grain, and perhaps offering discounts for “feedlot fed.”
The real attractions in expanding the market are not only in the benefits dairy farmers would gain, but the improvement in health consumers could see. But if the product isn’t what it should be, then the health benefits could be illusory–and raw milk would be labeled as just so much hype.
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As Don Neeper points out following my previous post, that press release that the Food and Drug Administration asked Mark McAfee to try writing—concerning a recall of 21 pints of raw cream—is getting special play in Kentucky. A variation on the FDA press release quotes the state’s director of the division of public health as follows: “Healthy individuals may suffer from symptoms such as high fevers, severe headaches, stiffness, nausea, abdominal pain and diarrhea,” said Guy Delius, acting director for the division of public health and safety. “Listeriosis can cause miscarriages and stillbirths among pregnant women. Because there have been worldwide phone order sales for this product and possibly some in Kentucky, we wanted to make sure local families were aware of the withdrawal of this product, and that if purchased, it should not be consumed.” If the FDA and Kentucky bureaucrats were reading this blog, they wouldn’t be talking about miscarriages and stillbirths, or any listeria illnesses from raw milk– as reported here, the Centers for Disease Control’s own statistics show no illnesses from listeria in raw milk between 1973 and 2005.
I am in Detroit this week working with the Michigan farmers in the their fight for raw milk freedom. It is nuts to think that raw milk from Wisconsin comes to CA for OPDC use. Some body is smoking something!!?? OPDC uses its own raw milk for its own products. The only exception is raw cream to make butter and this is not routine, it is occasional.
I wish other farmers would join me…but none are doing so. I share all of my experience with anyone who asks. I have been told by many farmers that raw milk costs too much and exposes them to too much liability. In CA there are no more small dairies. Few farmers have the money or interest in running the entire food chain. Ask the Stueves (own an organic dairy and founders of Alta Dena)why they do not do raw milk anymore. They are exhausted with the fighting. FYI, it is not easy to make pathogen free raw milk in a confinement operation. You must use a pasture to get biodiversity (this makes safety much more reliable).
It takes guts, energy and passion to fight this fight. The OPDC vision and mission is not for sale. But if I can share a piece of the membership to get serious funds and to build a solar powered creamery and buy more pasture ground and build more mobile milk barns and lastly fund a Stanford Study on raw milk and fund a large consumer education program…then CA would start to lead the raw milk movement. At present…OPDC is taking incoming rounds from the FDA and CDFA and cannot respond. We must be powerful enough to get big and challenge the FDA and others with fulltime legal teams that kick their lying corrupt drug pushing asses.
Now… do you see were I am coming from? When this happens, other smaller dairies will have the protection and standards they need to exist in raw milk peace. If OPDC is to leadthen we must lead by example and show some strength. We will not betray mother nature or our consumers–that is a promise. Raw milk has a built-in integrity meter. If you cheat mother naturepeople get sick. OPDC will not sell unsafe milk. We are in 300 stores and we have 10 stores per week begging to be added to our routes. Do the math.we need to grow because our consumers are demanding food that heals. Food that prevents asthma and does not create lactose intolerance and increases bone density quickly.
The FDA says use Fosamax not raw milk to build bones. The FDA says use Lactaid if you are lactose intolerant. The FDA says use Celebrex if you have joint pain. The FDA says use VIOXX if you are in pain. These FDA approved drug cures have killed 100,000 Americans and have dissolved the jaw bones in thousands more. These are very very sick corrupt criminals. When the FDA makes news in Kentucky with OPDC raw cream that is not even in that state you know they want to hurt OPDC anyway they can. Even with lies and corruption. They warn about illness but there were none!!
I askwhere is the anger and where is the passion to look these sick institutions in the eye and change them.fire them.
Sheepeople just take it. We the people must change it. Our forefathers would have been in the streets with their guns years ago. Not uswe are a generation of pathetic fearing sheep. We have genetically evolved and now we do not even know how to be warriors with integrity. At least we have the virtual battlefield where we can still safely argue with words and hopefully change others minds from the safety of the key board and blogs.
OPDC must become strong and be able to fight for all conscious Americans effectively. If not the raw milk community (farmers and consumers alike) will continue to bleed and take casualties on the unbalanced field of nutritional battle. Make no mistakethis is battle with dead Americans with an FDA approved body count. Thousands of them every month.
Focus the passion where it belongsfocus the energy against the FDA and others oppressing our freedom to eat whole foods that heal.
Then get real and support your local raw milk source as an act of defiance and health freedom.
Mark McAfee
Founder OPDC
With the high demand for raw milk in your market area, which would you see as more ideal? To use your abilities to help another family start a dairy and work together to meet demands or expand your existing operation?
Rod
Please dont misconstrue my concern for alarm. Im happy for Mark. There is a place in the movement for heavy hitters, leaders with the capital to get greater things done. But this cannot be a movement of the big boys. It would be a better vision of a flotilla of little boats, all following the ice breaker as it plows a channel through the ice pack. An armada of supertankers, following the advantage of open water, would create too much wake.
Its good to see that the future looks promising for raw milk. Venture capitalists usually do their homework, and the possibility of the deal could be a watershed occurrence.
California is quite renown for its capacity to initiate agricultural trends and change. A better question to ask would be how many cow share programs have started there this past year? How many small, personal, family farms have started to cultivate a customer base and supply the demand for raw milk? What does the presence of a mega raw dairy have on the ability for these smaller operations to get started? Will a bigger more powerful OP tilt the playing field even steeper against the little guys trying to build a herd? Will a more powerful OP be a stronger advocate and carry the raw milk message more effectively to the masses (and therefore benefiting even the little guys)?
Much to ponder.as we go forward.
This is only the beginning of many things to come. What will happen with over population? What will happen when we have to listen to them push us to start eating cloned meat? We already have GMO’s in our food. Even though I enjoy meat, milk and so forth, we have to realize that the day will come where there will be more demand and less supply and then what do we do?
Our waters are contaminated, right? We can’t even get wild fish sometimes anymore, so we have to pay the high dollar for that as well.
You almost do have to have more money than the average Joe to be able to eat healthy whole foods, unless you live on a farm and grow everything yourself, but how many of us do that nowadays? We don’t even have the time to cook food, hence…fast food nation.
Personally, I will spend whatever it takes to ensure good quailty whole foods are being consumed in my house. I think we should be so thankful that there are people like Mark, who are fighting for our rights. If he goes big, that is a BIG statement to the government and he is all about rocking the boat and testing the limits and he should be. There are some people who are passive and there are those people, like Mark and myself, we are active…pro-active.
Mark has done a lot for California and the raw revolution and it seems like it is finally paying off for him. I am happy for him. See, hard work and perserverance will eventually come back to a person two-fold, Mark! Keep it up and keep me on the list for investors :)!!!
I hear your reassurance in maintaining quality and integrity should you expand with "investers". In the past when companies "expanded" the quality seemed to go out the window. I fear the quality/safety would disappear to your raw milk. I won’t drink just anyone’s raw milk, I do check your site for your tests results, and I have friends who fear for my health that monitor raw milk recalls.A few months ago, I had seen raw milk in Sacramento by another dairy, I did not buy thiers as I knew nothing of that dairy. .I fear your dairy may become like so many other large "businesses" and the lack of sanitary conditions and feedlots would prevail. I can imagine, as another posted, the "bottom line" would be the most important item for the big business…
Do I need to keep the potential purchase of that little Jersey on the back burner? (I’d really rather NOT milk any cows)
I’m not wishing that you don’t grow, I just worry that the raw milk I buy will become spilt milk.
I am well into reading (but have set aside for the moment to concentrate on Gary Taubes’ new book) a book called So Shall We Reap (How everyone who is liable to be born in the next ten thousand years could eat very well indeed; and why, in practice, our immediate descendants are likely to be in serious trouble) (Paperback)
by Colin Tudge (Author). He makes a very interesting argument that the world population will level off in not so very many future generations, then after a period of stable numbers, even decline some, and that the world *can* feed these people, if food production is done right. I haven’t done any other looking into this yet to see where his argument doesn’t hold water (while the authro seems very wall researched an knowledgeable about population studies and food production, already I have sussed out that the author is sadly misinformed about soem nutrition/health issues: saturated fats being "unhealthful", for example, so that raises my eyebrows a notch). And the food production "done right" issue is possibly an even bigger problem than any population number issues. Comments from anyone else who has read this book or who knows something about population pressures and food supplies/production? I’d love to learn more about this, for example, is it really all doom and gloom at this point on the world population statistics, especially now that mnay countries’ population growth rates have slowed since the alarms when out in the 60s and 70s? Or is that a perception no longer groudned in reality?
Good Calories, Bad Calories: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom on Diet, Weight Control, and Disease.
I dropped off the low fat bandwagon years ago, and Taube’s book isn’t the first I’ve learned about the lousy science behind the low fat hypothesis, but so many still cling to low fat and low cholesterol as gospel. I hope this book is effective at showing how *little* scientific evidence there really is that low fat eating is an effective health strategy, for heart disease or wany health benefit.
I grew up eating what was put on the table.It was basically what my parents grew up on.Though I am sure I had much more additives and chemicals than they ever had. My dad was raised on a dairy in Pheonix back in the 30s until he was drafted. He grew up on fried foods, the more grease the better. Whole milk, thick cream, real butter, meat with a lot of fat on it, etc. He is in his 80s and not on any medications, he still "plows" with the old rotiller (It is really funny to watch) He climbs on the roof and does most of what he has always done. Mom grew up with a huge sweet tooth. No medications for her either. Up until about 7 years ago they went 4 wheeling up on the old logger roads in northern CA, they didn’t know they were old. When dad goes and has coffee with his ole cronies, he is always amazed that the other guys are on so many medications and hobbling around with walkers and canes and they are 10- 20 years younger than him. Years ago I had read a study about the Amish, they don’t (or didn’t 10-20 years ago) have the same health problems that the general population has, at least not to the same extent. I do believe that diet is a major contributing factor to ones health. If you buy a jar of canned peaches, it is packed in glucose/sucrose (sugar) water, and there are many chemicals that are not mandatory to list on the lable, so you don’t know all of what goes into your body. I think, unless you have a disease or physical anomaly then eating a variety of foods in moderation is good. (And I mean foods with no additives in any way.)
Other than growing your owm, how would you know if something really is truely organic? I don’t buy food at wallyworld. And I also don’t buy produce from other than American farms. I use the local farmers market weekly. My coffee and tea do come from elswhere.