Latest / CattleUSA Daily / 238: Behind the Scenes of the Beef Checkoff with Terry Quam

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238: Behind the Scenes of the Beef Checkoff with Terry Quam · CattleUSA Daily

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Today we are welcoming Terry Quam on to the podcast to talk
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about Cattle Con next month and just some other things that have
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been going on in the beef industry over the past 40 years
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and the Cattlemen's Beef Board and what we can kind of
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anticipate as we go into spring and the coming months as well.
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This is just a really great conversation with Terry,
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catching up with him. We've had him on the podcast
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about four Times Now and so it's just really fun to catch up and
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hear what's going on in his state of Wisconsin as a cattle
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producer out there as well. So before we pop into today's
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podcast episode, if you're watching on YouTube, make sure
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you take a second to go hit that subscribe button and like this
0:35
episode. And if you're watching on any of
0:37
our other podcast platforms, make sure you go rate and review
0:39
the podcast as well. Without further ado, let's go
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ahead and hear from Terry. Welcome to the Cattle USA Daily
0:49
Podcast, your go to source for the latest livestock markets,
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industry insights and the updates shaping agriculture
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today. I'm your host, Lauren Moylan, a
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passionate advocate for agriculture here to keep you
1:00
informed and connected. Now let's dive into today's
1:04
episode. Terry, welcome back to the
1:12
podcast. So excited to have you on.
1:15
How was your new year, your Christmas, all the things.
1:18
They were great. You know, now that I got
1:20
grandkids and what have you, I don't have to open a present.
1:24
I mean, I can just kids open them up for me, get it done and
1:30
they're happy and excited and and fun.
1:32
No, it was all great. We had six different Christmases
1:36
here on the farm, 4 in our big heated shop and two in the
1:39
house. And so I will say this, at the
1:43
end of those six, I was ready for Christmas to be over.
1:46
I'd had enough. But no, it was a great year.
1:50
Usual. The little grandkids brought in
1:52
some fun illnesses that went through the families, but that's
1:57
all part of having grandkids. It absolutely is.
2:00
We had our last family Christmas this last Saturday, and it was
2:03
our large extended family, one that's like 60 or 70 of us.
2:07
And the I think we were all in the same boat.
2:09
We were like, yeah, I'm kind of glad that we're done now, but I
2:14
can put family Christmases in the rearview mirror and have my
2:18
weekends back and our weekdays back and not be, Oh my gosh, I
2:22
think I cooked so many an obscene amount of cinnamon
2:25
rolls, a crazy amount of, I make these like little puff pastry
2:28
twist. I was in the kitchen nonstop.
2:31
And you know what? We just got through our
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leftovers today and I am making chili and cinnamon rolls again.
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And I was like, that's the best part about Christmas is having
2:40
all the leftovers and not having to cook for like a week.
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But you know, we're back to it. So.
2:46
Yeah. For me, it was just getting my
2:47
farm shop back because that's we hold our production sales in the
2:50
farm shop and that's where we also hold a lot of these bigger
2:53
Christmas events. And I just want my heated shop
2:56
back when it was 0 and below zero.
2:58
I want my heated shop. Rightfully so I could not blame
3:02
you one bit on that like you know, the tables and chairs get
3:04
them out of the way. I I don't want to work outside
3:07
and you guys have had some crazy weather up where you are as
3:10
well. We have and Kansas been pretty
3:12
lucky recently and been pretty warm and all of those things,
3:15
but you guys have been cold and wet and snow and rain and
3:20
everything else in between. So yeah, we've had the gamut.
3:23
We've had the gamut. We got 8 inches of wet snow and
3:26
then it froze and then it all melted and we got 1/2 inch of
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rain and then we got some more snow and now it's raining.
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Today 45°, going to be 48 tomorrow, so you never know.
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This is Wisconsin. We get everything.
3:41
Absolutely. I completely understand that.
3:44
But are you headed to Cattlecon next month in February?
3:48
Terry Yeah, we'll be leaving on Sunday morning, flying out and
3:52
heading down for all the meetings and all the activities.
3:55
And probably the best part is get to see all the people you've
3:59
gotten to meet over the years and catch up with everybody.
4:02
Absolutely. I'm headed down myself, but I
4:04
have ANCW events beforehand because I'm the Kansas ANCW
4:08
president. And so I fly in on Friday and
4:12
then I fly out on Friday. And I know damn well by the time
4:16
that noon flight comes around on Friday, I'm going to be crawling
4:19
to the airport. Like Take Me Home, boys and
4:22
girls. Like I, I don't have it in me
4:24
anymore. I'm typically a person that's in
4:26
bed by 8:00 PM every night. And whenever I go to Calocon, I
4:29
inevitably get drugged out to the bars every single night by
4:34
all of the other bad influences in my life.
4:36
And I know some of y'all are listening to this and boy, oh
4:40
boy, it's a great time. But that Friday's going to come
4:43
around. I'm going to be like, Take Me
4:44
Home. Yeah, Sunday to Friday is enough
4:47
for me. Rightfully so.
4:48
Rightfully so. Well, what are you most looking
4:50
forward to on while we're at Cattle Con?
4:54
Well, I think just the meeting some hearing updates from all
4:56
our contractors through the check off, you know, seeing
5:00
where their progress is there six months into their basically
5:04
six months into their projects now seeing where they're headed,
5:07
hearing from the producers on what do they think what's going
5:11
on out in the industry? What's the talk out there?
5:13
Just whatever comes about in our industry, we'll get discussed
5:18
there. And of course we deal with
5:21
driving beef demand. That's our goal at the on the
5:24
check off side at CBB is ours is how do we build beef demand?
5:29
And I think a lot of it is the great thing about Cattle Con is
5:33
every one of them. Cattlemen's Beef Board meetings
5:35
are open to the public. Anybody can come in as long as
5:39
you can get registered and get into Cattle Con.
5:42
Any cattle producer from across the United States can come in
5:46
and sit in on them meetings, sit through the financials, sit
5:50
through the budget and audit committee, sit through every
5:54
check off evaluation committee, sit through everything, hear it
5:58
all. You don't have to be a board
5:59
member, which it's totally transparent, totally open to
6:03
everybody. And I think that's the great
6:05
thing about it. If you have questions about it
6:07
and you're a cat at Cattlecon, sit in on one of the meetings,
6:11
ask every question you can ask. And that's the great thing about
6:14
Cattlecon is when you have 810 thousand people there, you do
6:18
get full rooms and you get a lot of a lot of interaction.
6:21
Yeah, absolutely. I always enjoy the meetings too,
6:24
because especially as someone who loves all of my just
6:28
networking and all of the things that I get to do there of I get
6:32
to see people at Cattle Con that I see once a year, right, Like I
6:37
see them at Cattle Con every year because they're from all
6:40
over the United States. We get to see such a diverse
6:42
producer population as well, which I think is just always so
6:46
fun because we do a ton of regional events.
6:48
We've got different things across the United States
6:50
throughout the years, but this is like the one centralized
6:52
event where we can come and we can have all the meetings.
6:54
We can do all the things and just get the progress reports on
6:57
what is happening and what's developing.
7:00
So can you kind of discuss just any priorities or just emerging
7:04
challenges that you're kind of seeing right now and that are
7:08
going to be discussed at Kadocon?
7:10
I don't think we're seeing, again, the biggest topic is
7:13
going to be one that we can't talk about.
7:15
And that's what President Trump said about Argentina.
7:18
And that card, again, that goes over to the policy side.
7:21
And that's one thing everybody has to realize.
7:24
We don't touch policy. We only touch things that drive
7:29
beef demand. I think one of the things that's
7:32
going to be very interesting is the committee that sits there on
7:35
international marketing. I guarantee you that room will
7:39
be packed. Everybody's going to want to
7:41
know exactly what the tariffs are doing, how much we're
7:45
exporting, how much we're importing, all those types of
7:48
things. That'll always be a hot topic.
7:51
But I think the biggest thing to me, looking at the meetings and
7:57
looking at everything is the budget and audit committee.
8:00
How do we project into the next year knowing that we're going to
8:04
have less revenues, knowing that the cattle herd is down, How do
8:09
we sustain and keep building on our successes and how do we
8:13
build programs with less dollars?
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And I think that's the key is I think that's going to be a lot
8:20
of talk that on all the committees, how do we main and
8:24
build and grow greater success with less money.
8:29
Yeah, I think that's a big question on a lot of people's
8:31
minds because I mean, every single time we're at cattle con,
8:35
there's that division of like the policy side and like, hey,
8:39
we're not here to discuss that. There's different things that
8:41
we're doing here with the check off because the check off and
8:44
cattle con aren't like the, the cattle con is not run by the
8:49
beef check off. And I think that sometimes that
8:52
gets confused and kind of muddled for people.
8:55
So can you explain that? Because I know how I explain it
8:58
to people a lot is it's like it's the same thing as American
9:01
National cattle Women's being at Cattle Con.
9:03
We just can be there and we have meetings there, but we're a
9:08
completely separate entity, right?
9:09
Like we're still associated, but it's different.
9:12
So can you kind of explain that and how that goes on, how the
9:15
fact that like you guys are there having meetings, but it's
9:17
also different at the same time? Yes, it's totally different.
9:21
Cattlecon is actually put on by the National Cattlemen's Beef
9:24
Association. We are a partner.
9:26
We do help. We do.
9:28
We are there just like NCW is. We're there.
9:32
Why? Because if you look at the
9:34
logistics, you have how many people?
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8 to 12,000 people coming to one spot at one time, 2.
9:41
The biggest reason we're there is cost.
9:44
Think about it. The rooms are there, the hotels
9:47
are there, the meeting center is there.
9:50
If we had to break away and have a whole separate conference and
9:54
have separate events and what have you, our cost would
9:58
skyrocket. And one of the biggest things
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that on the Cattlemen's Beef board that is thrived is
10:04
economic savior savory saving. We want to make sure we use
10:10
every dollar to build beef demand.
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We don't want to do it expending plane tickets, hotel rooms,
10:16
ballrooms, meeting rooms. We want to make every dollar
10:20
that's invested in this check off work and be done that way.
10:25
So to me, the biggest reason to hold it with Cattlecon is you
10:29
have people coming to a central location, you have a facility
10:32
there that we can basically cut our costs in less than half by
10:37
being with them. It's to me that's the biggest
10:40
reason, cost savings. We've got to preserve those
10:43
dollars for things that really matter.
10:45
Yeah, absolutely. And another thing that's going
10:48
to happen at Cattle Con is some just different board things
10:52
within just the beef board and everything as well.
10:56
So can you talk about the producer governance of the beef
10:59
Board and kind of how the beef Board is made-up, how those
11:01
decisions are made, all of those things as well?
11:04
Well, it is an important, this is an important time because
11:08
this is where your committees like your beef operating
11:12
committee will be selected back in at the last at the summer
11:17
business meeting. Every region, the Cattlemen's
11:20
Beef Board is broken out into regions and every state on their
11:24
cattle numbers are given X amount of people that can be on
11:28
the Cattlemen's Beef Board. And so every Reed, you're broken
11:31
down into six regions and those six people elect someone to be
11:36
on what's called the nominating committee.
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And that nominating committee is elected by the regions.
11:42
They're the ones that will decide who's going to be on the
11:45
beef operating committee, and that beef operating committee is
11:50
the people that will decide where the money is going to be
11:53
spent in the following year in September.
11:56
Also at that one, your secretary, treasurer, your vice
12:00
chairman and your chairman are elected, going through the same
12:04
thing that the people with the beef operating committee have to
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do. I'm running for vice chair.
12:09
I will sit down with the nominating committee for a 30
12:13
minute interview and be fired questions at me about who knows
12:17
what. And the nice thing about it is
12:20
it's always new people on that nominating committee.
12:23
You have no idea where the questions are going to come,
12:26
what they're going to ask you about, what they want you to
12:28
prioritize. But the big thing about this set
12:31
of meetings here is there's a lot of people elected to
12:34
positions that will make the decisions in the upcoming years.
12:39
The other thing that happens here is you will hear the
12:42
progress reports of all your contracts that you've got out
12:45
there with your people that do the work for the check off,
12:49
whether it be in research, whether it be an education,
12:51
whether it be an international marketing, what have you.
12:54
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that that goes back
12:57
to the structure of this is producer run.
13:00
And so every producer has the opportunity to make that
13:04
decision that like, hey, if I want to see this, I want to see
13:08
this happen, I think that I can make a real change.
13:11
You have that opportunity to be in those rooms to apply for
13:15
these boards to do all of these different things that can really
13:19
push the industry forward, which I think is one of the best parts
13:22
about this aspect of the beef board is that it is producer run
13:26
and that we as regions can look to the people in our regions
13:30
that are representing us, US and really lean on them.
13:33
If we have issues or questions or policy change, not policy,
13:37
but different changes that we want to see or just different
13:40
things like that as we continue to move forward, as well as the
13:42
beef industry. And I think that's one thing
13:44
people's got to realize. This is a national organization.
13:48
Those six regions go from coast to coast, east to West,
13:51
north-south. You have a lot of differences of
13:54
opinion. And one of the greatest
13:56
strengths of the beef cattle industry is how many segments do
13:59
we have? We're not like the dairy
14:01
industry or not like the hog or poultry industry.
14:05
We have backgrounders, we have feed yards, we have purebred
14:09
people, we have commercial people.
14:11
We have grass feeders, we have grain feeders.
14:14
It is a wide, diverse group of people that come together.
14:19
And it's the one time that you get to hear the whole industry
14:22
speak together and you get to hear, I'm from Wisconsin, I'm
14:26
totally different than somebody probably in California.
14:31
How we grow things, how we run things, you get to hear a lot of
14:35
different perspectives and you get to merge those perspectives
14:38
into a national program to go out and build the beef demand.
14:42
Yeah. And I think that's also one of
14:43
the challenges of it too, right, is I think so often especially
14:47
like we're like there's a big concentration of cattle in the
14:50
Midwest. And so sometimes we can be a
14:54
little center minded and really think that we're the only part
14:57
of the United States that produces the amount of cattle
14:59
that we do. And although we do have a large
15:02
volume of cattle, there also are a vast variety of differences
15:07
between what we're doing here in Kansas and what we're doing in
15:11
California or New York or Florida and how we're raising
15:14
our cattle. And so I think that's also one
15:15
of the challenges too, is as a national organization saying,
15:19
hey, this is representing Florida cattlemen and this is
15:22
representing Kansas cattlemen. The decision that we're making
15:24
here, even though you guys are in 2 vastly different parts of
15:28
the United States and raise cattle vastly different as well.
15:32
Yeah, and political climates are different in every state.
15:36
So I mean, it, it, it's just a great, when you look at the
15:40
founding members that back in the 80s that recognized that our
15:44
industry was in trouble. I'm, I was a young cattleman in
15:49
1980 in the, in the mid 80s. I remember those struggles of
15:53
high interest rates, slowing beef demand, consumer that
15:57
didn't want our product, a medical industry that was
16:01
bashing us at every turn. And I really got to give them a
16:04
credit to those founding members that sat there and said, we're
16:08
going to put on our boots, we're going to pull them up.
16:11
We're going to pull our pants up and we're going to get this job
16:14
done and we're going to tell the consumer and we're going to
16:17
prove to the consumer that we have the healthiest protein out
16:20
there. And over 40 years we've done
16:23
that. When you look at the amount of
16:25
research that our check off is funded, the amount of education
16:30
both on the producer consumer and now into the classroom into
16:34
the kids that we're doing. I don't think there's any
16:38
greater success story then then what the producer can take
16:42
credit for doing on their own because they knew no one else
16:46
was going to do it for him. And so I really do give a lot of
16:49
credit to them founding members back then again, I was a young
16:52
cattleman with young kids and I didn't have time to get involved
16:56
back then. I do now.
16:57
So I mean, it's been A, to me, a great success story of you look
17:02
at the things and I always revert back to I don't know how
17:06
many people remember the the cow they call the cow that stole
17:10
Christmas. And that was, you know, a cow
17:13
that came down with BSE in the state of Washington.
17:17
And all of a sudden I was state cattlemen's president at the
17:22
time. So I wasn't on the check off
17:24
side. I was on the policy side.
17:26
I curl on Tuesday night and I do that to get away from
17:29
agriculture and I go curling that night and all of a sudden
17:34
somebody that is not in the cattle world tells me what
17:37
happened to the beef industry. What's wrong?
17:40
And I hadn't looked at my phone or I hadn't talked to anybody.
17:44
And so I got home, checked everything out and sure as heck
17:47
that's what happened. It was announced at BSc and the
17:50
next morning and I looked at my messages on my phone and you
17:54
sure as heck there's a meeting at 9:00 the next morning on BSc
17:58
and also said there'll be a package FedEx that's your door
18:02
by 8:00 that morning. I got a 2 inch binder with
18:06
everything there is to know about BSc facts and what have
18:10
you. And how did that binder get
18:12
prepared? How did it get to me so fast?
18:15
It got to me because there's a check off program that looks
18:19
specifically for the next problems our industry may face.
18:24
And BSc was brought to them and they had a prepared document
18:29
ready to go in the event that we had a BSc case in the US.
18:34
And I can tell you that I did that night.
18:37
It was Christmas Eve the next day.
18:40
That night I did 4 radio interviews and we did three TV
18:43
remotes on the farm. And coming out of that event,
18:47
the industry rating by the consumer on the perception of
18:51
beef actually went up because the industry was prepared.
18:56
And that was your producer dollars preparing your fellow
18:59
producers like me, giving us what to talk about, how to talk
19:04
about it and solve the problem and tell the consumer that beef
19:09
is safe, beef is nutrition, beef is great.
19:11
And to me, those are the success stories that nobody wants to
19:15
talk about, that the check off is done.
19:18
And we have that in the background.
19:20
And it's on any kind of episode that the beef could face coming
19:24
up forward. And to me, that is Peace of
19:28
Mind, knowing that we are prepared for any contingency
19:33
that could come forward. Yeah, absolutely.
19:36
I mean, you look over the past 40 years and there are hundreds
19:40
of different scenarios and situations that you can point to
19:43
with success stories of like, hey, this really bad thing
19:47
happened and we were able to respond fast.
19:50
Or hey, this is what we saw on the research side.
19:53
Like we put millions of dollars towards research and we were
19:56
able to do this. Or hey, we put millions of
19:58
dollars towards education. We were able to do this and get
20:02
in classrooms and get to those unreached communities and.
20:05
Really share the story of beef because as much as we would like
20:08
to think as producers that we could do it ourselves, at the
20:12
same time we still do have to produce cattle.
20:15
We have to be on the ranch. We have to be doing these things
20:18
that we do everyday to make our livelihoods.
20:20
And not all of us have the time, availability, financials, all of
20:25
that to go and fund research projects, to go into schools and
20:29
give presentations and to share about the beef industry, to go
20:33
and do all of these things that that the check off is able to do
20:37
for us. And we're able to sit back and
20:40
do what we do best and let the researchers do what they do best
20:44
or the educators do what they do best and continue to share the
20:47
story of beef. Well, I think that's the whole
20:51
thing and we can't do it all. And that's why we fund some
20:55
research projects like the Meet Demand Monitor through Kansas
20:59
State University, through Cattlemen's USA as our sponsor,
21:03
through the check off that comes out every month.
21:06
And that measures 2000 consumers, what their priorities
21:10
are, what their preferences are, what their feelings are.
21:13
There's ten different things there that we monitor and that
21:16
month that goes out to the press monthly, what the consumers
21:19
thinking. And so to me, that research is
21:22
invaluable. We want to know what our
21:25
customers think and want and expect.
21:29
And you look at 40 years of doing projects like that and
21:35
building the international marketplace up and the research
21:38
that goes into and looking at is a foreign country worth
21:43
investing time and money in to get our product over there.
21:47
Those things are all things that this dollar pays for.
21:50
And especially on the education side, when you look at the
21:53
amount of money that we stick into educating our professional
21:57
nutritionists and doctors and medical world, someone has to
22:02
give them the credible research. And that's the key to this whole
22:06
thing. The research that we fund is
22:08
done by universities, done by entities that have reputations,
22:12
credibility. So when the research is done,
22:16
it's reliable. And that to me is very, very
22:19
critical. And and the key to this whole
22:22
check off funding program is, is a balanced approach.
22:27
How much do you put into research?
22:29
How much do you put into education?
22:31
How much do you put into marketing?
22:33
After all, in the marketing side, how many people don't know
22:36
the slogan beef is what's for dinner?
22:38
One of the most successful programs we've ever had.
22:41
And an example of that is the COVID year.
22:44
Before the COVID year, more meat was consumed outside the home
22:49
than inside the home. What happened during COVID?
22:52
Everything shuts down. Restaurants are done, fast
22:55
food's done, everything's done. What happens in the beef is
22:59
what's for dinner. They were able to to do a 90°
23:03
flip right away. Put recipes out there for people
23:06
to cook at home. How to get the valued cuts in
23:09
there like your roasts and your rib meats and your Stew meats
23:14
and what have you. How to teach people how to cook
23:17
again at home. Because we have generations out
23:20
there that didn't learn, that didn't want to learn it.
23:22
And look at what's happened now after COVID.
23:26
We're getting more meat consumed in the household than we are on
23:29
the restaurant side of things. So your check off was prepared,
23:33
ready to go, had the recipes, had the knowledge, had the
23:37
nowhere knowethal to do the change and get to the consumer
23:42
and say, hey, if you're not going to the restaurant, eat
23:45
your beef this way at home, here's how you cook it, here's
23:48
how you do it. And to me, that's again another
23:50
success story of how your producers thought ahead and made
23:54
sure that program was prepared. Yeah, absolutely.
23:59
I, I could not agree more on that.
24:01
So as we as we move forward to the next 40 years, what are kind
24:04
of your thoughts, hopes, dreams, aspirations?
24:07
Where do you see the beef check off going in the next 40 years
24:11
as we just continue to look forward?
24:13
Well, I think we continue on a very successful path.
24:16
I think that the me to me as we get short of dollars here, how
24:21
do we balance this thing? How do we make it work?
24:24
So we can still do credible research, we can still do great
24:28
education. We can still do things that
24:32
promote the beef in the consumer marketplace, the international
24:36
marketplace. And we also got to educate a
24:39
whole group of producers out there that don't know why the
24:43
check off was ever started. They have no, no regulation of
24:48
what it was like back in the late 70s and early 80s to be a
24:52
cattleman. They don't remember losing big,
24:54
big, big dollars and have a consumer reject you.
24:58
And so I think part of it is to tell the history, tell them why,
25:02
why the check off is important. But again, to me, what we got to
25:06
look forward to on the next 40 years is keeping this program
25:10
really balanced. Keep it so we still do good,
25:15
credible research, great education, great marketing
25:19
programs so that we're hitting all segments of our industry and
25:24
so that everybody in the industry from cow calf all the
25:27
way through to the finished product can make a profit in
25:30
this thing and stay viable. Yeah, absolutely.
25:34
I think that that is one of the biggest things to especially on
25:38
the producer education side because it is so important that
25:41
we're informing our consumer population.
25:44
But I think that there's still a lot of controversy on the
25:47
producer side. And I think that that's never
25:49
not going to be a thing, right? Like there's always going to
25:52
people be the people that dig their heels down and don't don't
25:57
want to be part of it. And that's totally fine.
25:59
Like there's there's always going to be that.
26:01
But to that producer that maybe doesn't fully understand the
26:04
beef check off what it does, all of those things.
26:07
What would you kind of say to that person?
26:09
Get involved. I've told that to many people
26:11
and I've had some people that have really taken taken that to
26:14
heart, got involved. Dig into the check off, check
26:18
out the programs. Get on the website, beef.org.
26:22
Everything is there. The finances are there, the
26:25
minutes are there, every program is there.
26:27
Come to Cattlecon, come to summer business meeting.
26:30
Sit in on these meetings. Invest in it.
26:33
It's easy to sit back and say they're just it ain't working
26:36
for me. I was brought up a little
26:37
different. I always get involved, dig into
26:41
it, figure it out. How can you make it better?
26:44
To me, I think that's the way I've always looked at it.
26:47
I'm not on the Cattlemen's Beef board.
26:49
For me, I'm 70 years old. My time has come and it is
26:54
slowly going the other way. I'm in it for my kids and my
26:57
grandkids and I want to make sure this industry is viable for
27:00
them and that's the way I look at it.
27:03
But to those guys and gals that just can't see the value in the
27:07
check off, all I say give it a fair look.
27:11
Take a look, go to your state beef councils, sitting on them,
27:15
sitting on their meetings they're open to and take a good
27:19
look at what we're doing and the fact that we're trying to make
27:22
this work for everybody. Yeah, absolutely.
27:25
And I'm always a big proponent of if you have an issue with
27:28
something, don't just be the loudest voice in the room, Be
27:32
the one that's willing to go and step into those leadership
27:35
positions and make a change. Like if you see something really
27:38
like that's not great in your producer community, in your
27:41
state, in your region, all of those things, and that's an
27:43
issue to you, go talk to the person that can either make the
27:45
change or become the person that can make the change with that.
27:48
And I think that that just goes back to getting involved as a
27:51
producer and the fact that like, yes, there are going to be those
27:55
times where you have to be on the ranch, but there's also
27:57
going to be those opportunities where you are given the chance
28:00
to step off the ranch and do something a little bit different
28:03
that's still going to further our beef industry.
28:05
So I kind of agree more, Terry. So anything else that you would
28:07
like to leave with our audience before we wrap it up?
28:10
No, I hope to see everybody at Cattle Con.
28:13
If not, if you see me out and about, say hi, introduce
28:17
yourself. I'd love to get to know you.
28:19
But as a Cattlemen's Beef board member and one of the national
28:24
officers, I do take a lot of pride in in what the check off
28:28
is doing and I really do wish everybody a successful 2026.
28:34
Wonderful. Thank you for your time, Terry.
28:36
To all of our listeners, thank you for listening to another
28:39
episode of the Cattle USA Daily Podcast.
28:41
We hope to see you at Cattle Con and as always, we will see you
28:44
all next time on another episode.
28:46
Have a good one y'all.