Dairy farmers across the country are diversifying their operations to stay in the business.
Dairy farmer Troy DeRosier realized four years ago that, with a disabled son, he needed a more reliable source of income. Rather than get out of the business – where volatile prices are as much a way of life as getting up early to milk the cows – he diversified.
Besides raising 100 Holstein on his Crystal Ball Organic Dairy Farm at Osceola, he now bottles milk and makes butter, cheese curds, yogurts and other dairy products. He sells them in a store on his property, and delivers them to 100 homes and 40 retail stores. He also sells through a distributor in Madison, Milwaukee and elsewhere.
“We control the market all the way to the consumer,” he said. DeRosier is part of a small but growing trend in America’s Dairyland and elsewhere around the country in which milk is bottled – and cheeses and ice cream made – then sold steps from where the cows graze.
Only a handful of the so-called farmstead operations existed in the state 10 years ago, said Jeanne Carpenter, a spokeswoman for the state’s Dairy Business Innovation Center, but she said that has grown to 21 and at least a half dozen more are expected to begin operation by next year.
Such an approach enables farmers to set their prices, and earn higher profit margins, said Jeremy Foltz, a University of Wisconsin assistant professor of agricultural and applied economics.
The Osceola farmer said he bottles his milk in glass containers rather than plastic, sells it non-homogenized and pasteurizes it in vats to accomplish that. He sets his own price, avoiding the whimsy of the wildly unpredictable market.
Dairy economist Robert Cropp, a University of Wisconsin emeritus professor, said farmstead operations have been around for some time but the current trend seems to be stronger.
Among the reasons, he said, is consumer demand for locally and organically grown foods.