Ten years ago, Pennsylvania dairy farmer Edwin Shank decided he wanted out of the crushing conventional system, and made the switch to organic production, and to selling his milk direct to consumers, unpasteurized. Nine years ago, this blog described his initial transition.
Around the country, American dairy farms are in big trouble. So big and seemingly insurmountable is the trouble that some dairy owners are committing suicide. It is the same trouble dairy owners have faced on and off for the last fifty years: processors keep milk prices so low that dairy farmers can’t make enough to live on, and profits flow to the processors.
Now, in his dairy’s newsletter, Shank updates customers on how the transition came about, and how it’s gone. Let’s just say that, after making the move out of conventional dairying, Shank has never looked back.
by Edwin Shank
Rejoice with us!
It was early Saturday, during order packing, that it hit me. I immediately called out to my wife
“Hey Dawn! Guess what today is?”
“It’s December the 8th,” she replied with a quizzical tone… “What’s so special about it?”
“Yeah,” I said, “It’s Dec 8th 2018! Ten years ago today was our first day as a certified organic farm! Can you believe it?!” And the same date marks 13 years since we made the momentous, scary pledge to stop any and all chemical use on our soils and animals.
10 years… wow! What a flood of memories that brings. What a ride it has been. God is so Good! What blessings He had planned! Blessings that we could in no way comprehend when taking those first fearful steps of faith and trust.
I recall with chagrin my days as a young farmer in the early 90’s. Dawn and I had taken over the farm from my parents immediately upon returning from our wedding trip in August of 1990. As a still-wet-behind-the-ears 20-year-old, I naturally looked to those older and more educated for answers. Agricultural university experts, government extension agents and the always helpful chemical, hormone and antibiotic reps seemed like trustworthy sources. Since they all agreed, there seemed to be no need to look further.
But after 15 years of innocently trusting their ‘overly friendly’ advice… we were worn out, our cows were burnt out and our soils exhausted. We were tired mentally, emotionally and physically. Our spirits were crushed and we were broke.
We had tried so hard… so heroically hard to be successful industrial dairy farmers. And if you judge by the copious volumes of milk, we were successful. Very successful! We were milking 340 cows three times per day, pushing all the grain, corn, soy and hormones that we could, and producing a full 6000 gallon tanker truck of milk every two days.
Except for one small, insignificant detail.
The industrial dairy market that we were slaves to refused to pay more than 11 cents per pint for our milk. Yes, you read that right… 11 pennies per pint. We couldn’t even feed the cows for that piddling amount. It was totally disgusting. And no amount of pleading would help.
The bank was threatening foreclosure of our 5th-generation family farm. I was worried, discouraged, embarrassed and afraid. The children remember me telling them one bleak November that we had until April to be on our farm unless God worked a miracle.
So we prayed… and prayed some more. It was our constant prayer for direction those months. And God did work a miracle!
But the miracle vision didn’t come all at once. It came in bits and pieces. Sort of like a mosaic… the pieces fell in place.
I started pursuing an interest in Jersey cows. And I also revisited a long latent fascination with grazing and pasturing cows. Then one day a piece of mail crossed my desk inviting more organic dairy farmers to come on board.
Suddenly the picture fell together like an epiphany. I remember exactly where I was sitting. I sat back in my chair like struck and spoke out loud. “Grazing Organic Jerseys!” This is it! This is what we are supposed to do! This is our mission.
But I had a lot of questions.
Organic dairy farming… How would that ever work? Wouldn’t the cows and calves all get sick and die if the farmer didn’t use antibiotics to keep them alive? How do you ever grow crops without chemical weed killers? And seriously, how can a farmer grow crops without chemical nitrogen and other chemical fertilizers?
These and other questions flooded my mind.
And God had answers!
The answers came in the form of experienced organic farmers that had pioneered before us. Thank you Rodney Martin, Mark Nolt, Joel Salatin, Wilmer Newswenger, Roman Stoltzfoos, Steve Fisher, Stanley Heisey and others. Your open-armed, open-hearted sharing of organic philosophy and practice is valued and will not be forgotten.
So the dream and vision keep developing… 10 years later the mosaics are still falling in place. We’re not sure what the final picture will be, but we trust the One who knows. We know it will be beautiful because He has the Master plan.
Thank you… all of you who support our organic farming dream by sourcing your foods here. Words fail us… we try to express it sincerely and often but it still feels totally inadequate.
Your decision to focus your food dollars in an ethical, regenerative farming direction undeniably plays the most important role in the miraculous ongoing rescue of our farm, our soils and our local farming community of farmers. We will never undervalue our tribe!
For more information, Your Family Farm runs two web sites: This is the main farm and store info site and how the farm receives orders for delivery to its 54 PA Drop Points. This one is specifically designed for the eastern 30 states, UPS To-Your-Door delivery.
David,
You got first part of the Shank Family Cow story right…but the true liberation came about in the second chapter. You spoke of the conversion from conventional to organic, but the most critical was the next evolution and his experience as he branded himself and connected to the end consumer and went raw!
You need to finish the story and tell the most important part. From organic to organic raw.
Just this week an organic dairyman in WI attempted suicide. Being organic is a first great step, but in this world of CAFO organic with rampant pasture rule cheating and over supply, being organic is just half the way point to true freedom.
True freedom comes when the farmer feeds people directly and that means organic and RAW. That is when sustainable economics and food as medicine begins to shine brightly.
David…tell the rest of the story!! You only have the first half.
Hi Mark! I called and spoke with your daughter about the possibility of visiting your farm. I don’t know if the call was well received given the first film I made was primarily on pet food. We have your milk and Kiefer available in some stores in Los Angeles and I’m one of your customers. I made a film on Netflix called Pet Fooled. I’m making a follow up film. The second film is looking at the human food industry and the silent FDA raw milk war 10+ years ago, which is a blue print they’re applying to the raw pet food manufacturers. The parallels are quite amazing and I would love to have you as one of the human food producers, given your advocacy and how you stood your ground with regulatory. I would love to be able to speak with you.
Mark, good point. What I published is Ed Shank’s recollection, from his farm’s newsletter, not my interpretation. But if it isn’t clear, it’s probably because he was focusing on the initial decision to escape the conventional system. Relatively few dairy farmers have made that transition. It entails three key components:
1. Deciding to go organic.
2. Deciding to sell dairy unpasteurized.
3. Deciding exactly how to market the raw dairy; as you suggest, this is most effectively, and profitably, done by selling direct.
My understanding is that Ed Shank took Step 3 last, and over a period of several years. At first, he sold a good chunk of his milk for cheesemaking. As the direct sales became more successful, he cut back on bulk sales to have enough milk for direct sales.
I spoke with Ed a few weeks ago obtaining information about setting up a lab for my raw pet milk. He is such a wealth of knowledge and had no problem sharing information with me. Pioneers like this has helped to keep going as I build my direct market selling raw goat milk. I’m a small operation now but I trust being on this path it will soon change to more sustainable farming. I’m glad Kelly Hessing told me about your blog.
We are so thankful for this farm!!!
Edwin may be saving part 2 of the story for his talk at the up coming PASA conference in Feb 2019: https://pasafarming.org/conference-registration-form/
Thanks for sharing your story Thanks for sharing your story, Edwin. Love your journey to epiphany as a mosaic.
Joe, where is the meeting? (Couldn’t get the link to open on my phone.)
Appreciate your blog, David.
Merry Christmas
Peg,
Try a web search for Pennsylvania Assocation Sustainable Agriculture. On that website look at the conference program.
My family has become huge fans of The Family Cow. After a farm tour back in 2010 I wrote this blog:
Raw Milk Road Trip
by Guest Blogger Joseph Heckman, PhD
http://hartkeisonline.com/2010/08/18/for-family-fun-tour-a-raw-dairy-farm/
Edwin,
You are one of my personal heros. A man of integrity, humility, intellect, vision, compassion and humanity. A man who lives his beliefs 7 days each week and not just on Sunday mornings. A man who has helped others to set up and operate on farm raw milk food safety labs ( 3M Petri Film ) and a man that has built a legacy of health in all of his customers.
If only the world had more Edwin Shanks. Go Ed!!
Aw… Mark…you give me more credit than you should. But thanks for your kind words anyway. We do like to help where we can.
And yes, you are right…this story of our transition from industrial to organic is not even half of the story. I hope to cover the rest in a series of three.
Part two is how we decided and learned to go Raw… that’s where you played a huge role Mark (and still do) Thank you!
Part three will be about building connections with real moms and dads and families who powerfully, passionately value these foods. This has been the highest personal satisfaction and sense of mission for our family. We have five sons and one son-in-law who are each highly energized to be included in this exciting mission.
That …speak volumes!
Congratulations Edwin Shank and family on your farming success! It is so heartening to hear that you are doing well after those precarious early years. I wish you continued success and happiness on your farm for generations to come.
My heart goes out to the dairy farmers still stuck in the conventional system. That system is desperately broken and is chewing up so many good people. We need farmers!
I’m a regular customer of The Family Cow/Edwin Shank, and they have some of the best raw milk I’ve had. They are also great to work with. I drive from out of state to buy their milk. I’m so thankful to the Lord for their farm and business.
Hi Edwin! We met at Sam’s trial. I’m happily following your escapades 🙂 I’ve been working with an Amish couple here — in their 20s and rarin to go raw. It’s SO SCARY for them to stop getting that commercial check. Raw customers are slim right now but lots of interest.
I gave them David’s book and F2C sent them lots of info. They spent last week in Lancaster visiting 3 Amish raw dairy farms, seeing how they manage it all. My family is practically living on their food: raw milk, chevre, BUTTER, cream, sourdough bread and cinnamon rolls, cottage cheese, yogurt… Love it!!! It’s really exciting to be a part of their journey, watch them grow.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Sally Oh,
You said something very profound and I am not sure that you realized that you said it….”Raw customers are slim right now but lots of interest”.
Why is that? It is because a farmer does not sell raw milk…he teaches it!
All of us Raw Milk dairymen need to be heavily committed to teaching customers and potential customers about raw milk and its powerful GUT biome and immunity building properties.
No one should think that by just “going raw” they will be rich or that magically there will be a boat-load of passionate excited customers ready to buy at three times organic price!
That is not reality. Many things stand in the way of customers flocking to raw.
Price point is much higher than organic and conventional and that is a road block, because costs are far higher for real food and especially raw organic milk. Cheap raw milk is dangerous raw milk. Cheap raw milk means someone is getting cheated. In the end it may even be the consumer and their safety.
If the customers does not understand the potential benefits of raw milk…why would they invest the money?
You don’t sell raw milk…you teach it. When the lessons are done and the consumer is excited about the research and the effects on the gut….then just a few will buy. It is not easy to reconnect food to medicine! Pharma and western medicine has done a stellar job of killing the connection between food and health.
Development of raw milk teaching tools and customer educational awareness is one of the big things that RAWMI is undertaking in the 2019 year. Now that RAMWI has gotten a good start on the risk management side of raw milk it is time to invest in consumer education at the other end of the food chain.
When doctors tell patients to avoid all dairy because it triggers asthma and allergies ( they are right but don’t know about raw ) …that is a real road block. When they tell patients to avoid raw dairy because it is unsafe and to only consume pasteurized, that creates a consumer mine field of confusion.
This is why RAWMI was formed. Safety and risk must be managed, assured and proved to be ultra low risk. That’s number one priority.
All other challenges fall into line after priority one!
If any farmer wants to play on consumer ignorance and just start by going “low cost against existing raw milk producers” we call that leaching. Its really a theft of raw milk consumers from those that built the market and do the investment.
New raw milk producers must be 110% committed to safety and then MUST take on the responsibility to be teachers and market builders. Raw milk consumers do not magically appear. They come as an effect of someone’s teaching and hard work.
I say…there are Teachers and there are Leachers.
Teachers are always welcome to the market…Leachers not so much. If you want to sell raw milk…start teaching and building!! if everyone and every raw dairy farmer taught raw milk to people, there would room for every single raw milk producer that wanted to serve people instead of the pasteurizer.
As Weston A Price said….you teach you teach you teach. His dying words. They must become our living words if we want to transform dairy and into a consumer beloved product!
One more thing,
I get the distinct honor of seeing the back story on RAWMI raw milk and bacteria counts from LISTED raw milk dairies.
You are correct, The Family Cow raw milk is right at the very top and among the best in the world and I can prove it with data.
Merry Christmas everyone.
and Edwin shank started RAWMI A FEW YEARS BACK AS WELL ABOUT 7 YEARS OR SO .thanks Edwin for all the advice you have given me
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/money/agriculture/2018/12/20/organic-farm-fake-scheme-bogus-corn-soybean-iowa-jericho-solutions-randy-constant/2376618002/
Ethics is so critical to organics and value added. My big question is this: where was the USDA all these years…. They didn’t do their jobs. The continue to miserably fail at their jobs with USDA pasture rule enforcement which is every much as fraudent as sale of conventional grain being sold as organic.
The organic CAFO 10,000 cow dairies that do not pasture yet claim that they do are just as criminally fraudulent and negligent as this grain broker. $140,000 dollars is big money. The CAFO operations violations will make this look like peanuts.
$140 million dollars is huge money. Excuse the typo. ???☘️
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/dairy-farming-is-dying-after-40-years-im-out/2018/12/21/79cd63e4-0314-11e9-b6a9-0aa5c2fcc9e4_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.1c1256b8361e
One hell of a Christmas present.
This is a wake up call to Climate change and how greed Trumps good dairy supply and price management policy.
“Get big or get out” wins as we all loose for next generations.
I say….get raw or ruin the planet from soil to soul.
Mark
in the article, he says that farmers do NOT want subsidies. They want a fair marketplace. But that’s out of the question as long as corporations can borrow ‘imaginary money’, from the banksters with which they out-compete return on investment of private capital.
Yes, the food processors are winning by cheating. No surprise there. That wickedness started back in the 1860s, with ligitimization of “Roman corporations”.
As far as I know, Organic Pastures raw milk dairy prospered relying on its own capital, without govt. aid. As old Georgie Gordon used to say : “America does not need ‘jobs jobs jobs’. What America needs is sales sales sales”
One of the critical factors of success for Raw milk dairies, is : dealing directly with the consumer. For farmers who can’t – or refuse to – adapt to merchandising of their own product … it’s all over but the crying.
there is nothing new under the sun ; at this URL is a short history of Roman corporations. Today, we’re at the stage when “engraftment” is business-as-usual in Washington DC. Elected officials / bureaucrats race traitors ‘on the take’ in high places knowing full well what they’re doing. Crypto-commies working policies so as to ruin private landowners so corporations can prey on them at ‘tax sales’.
https://www.glynholton.com/notes/corporation/
the owner of this Complete Patient blog ridicules the notion a grand intergenerational conspiracy is co-ordinating subversion of the Republic of the united States of America. Yet look at what has happened from govt. farm policy over the last century … corporate entities prevail while farm families are reduced to serfdom on the lands our forefathers carved from the Wilderness … exactly as George Washington predicted.
Before you sneer that ‘all this is only an outworking of good intentions’ acquaint thyself with the Communist Manifesto, and the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Sion