The Beef Checkoff is getting more education out to a pretty important audience: the retailers who sell the beef. During the recent 2015 Annual Meat Conference in Nashville, Tennessee, two checkoff-developed educational sessions drew more than 1,000 meat retailers.
At “The Changing Face of Supermarket Foodservice and the Keys to Long-Term Success,” the checkoff presented information about the growing opportunity beef has with supermarket prepared foods — including ready-to-eat or ready-to-heat meats at service counters or grab-and-go areas.
Also at the conference, Season Solorio, who leads the checkoff’s issues- and reputation-management team, participated in a panel discussion focused on communicating about modern agriculture and sustainability. The panel brought together representatives from the entire agricultural supply chain and covered multi-species, including a pork farmer, a packer and retail and foodservice consultants, to talk about the challenges each segment faces in trying to debunk myths, like “factory farming” and communicating how modern agriculture is more sustainable than it ever was in the past.
The beef checkoff also hosted a beef lunch to give retailers an inside look at the beef market and supply, market intelligence, issues monitoring and culinary opportunities.
“This was a key opportunity for the beef checkoff to reach a select group of retailers that help us market and move product,” said Federation of State Beef Councils Chairman Jennifer Houston, who attended the lunch. Houston is a livestock market operator from Sweetwater, Tenn. “The attendees had a unique opportunity to spend one-on-one time with industry experts to gain intelligence that will help them better sell more beef.”
Representatives of beef councils in 11 states that are active in beef checkoff retail and foodservice efforts participated in the conference.