Dairy Management Inc. hosted a news conference with CEO Tom Gallagher and Pennsylvania dairy farmer, DMI board member Harold Shaulis. Topic of discussion was dairy farmers’ longstanding commitment to dairy research that is making a difference in the marketplace.
Dairy farmers’ investment and vision for National Dairy Council (NDC) has resulted in 100 years of investments in research, communications and relationships with thought leaders, health and wellness professionals, schools, the government and consumers.
NDC’s research and work has yielded positive results for dairy farmers. Lately, there has been a re-examination of milk fat’s role in the diet. NDC staff are active leaders of the conversation as experts to ‘de-demonize’ dietary fats, including milk fat, for consumers.
Dairy farmers benefit from NDC’s work through the checkoff’s partnerships. A recent example is McDonald’s making the switch from margarine to butter at its 14,000+ U.S. stores. This means 500 to 600 million pounds of new milk equivalent usage each year.
McDonald’s was one of the checkoff’s first partners and the relationship has grown to where checkoff employees are housed at McDonald’s headquarters to help develop, test, position and market new dairy-friendly items.
So when McDonald’s said it wanted to use real American butter instead of margarine and needed the checkoff’s help to make the switch, it was the result of many factors, including the research, relationships, credibility of staff and their ability to help companies grow dairy sales.
Listen to the complete news conference here: DMI News Conference