The Rural Voice, 2002-02, Page 24The goal of Dr. Robert Church
in his address to Crops Day at
Grey -Bruce Farmers' Week
was to alter the Tong -held perceptions
of Ontario farmers and he did it right
from the moment of his introduction.
The "doctor" title, he said, was
not a professorship at a university but
a medical degree. He had practiced
for 25 years in a major city hospital
before returning to the ranch
pioneered by his family.
But if Grey -Bruce farmers found
it hard to imagine someone giving up
the income of a doctor for farming,
their perceptions were changed again
by the scale of the farming the
Church family undertakes. The
family had owned cattle ranches in
Australia, New Zealand and Hungary
but recently got out of the business in
the Pacific islands and bought land
instead in Argentina and Brazil. The
Churches run a feedlot with 25,000
to 30,000 head of cattle but with land
prices increasing in their own
backyard in Alberta, they sold some
of their holdings there and bought 20
sections (12,800 acres) in Manitoba
and Saskatchewan.
But those thinking that the Church
operation was a large-scale,
commodity producer had their
perceptions twisted again when he
said that for the past 20 years that
family operation hasn't produced any
crop that had to be marketed through
the Canadian Wheat Board. Instead,
this past year they grew 17 different
crops, many with relatively small
acreages. "We're growing it because
it makes money," he said. "I try to
produce what sells instead of selling
what I produce."
The barley they grow -goes
through their own feedlots. The
wheat grown is for seed or other
special -nature markets. Oats are sold
at a premium to horse markets in
Kentucky and California for $5 a
bushel after costs.
The Church strategy is to gain a
share of the value added past the
farm gate, to get a piece of what he
calls the "entertainment value" of
foods, and generally that means
grabbing a share of niche markets.
"Our cardinal rule is to stay off
the radar screens of the `big boys',"
Church said. "I don't want to
compete with Walmart. I want to
compete in a market that's not big
20 THE RURAL VOICE
BIG TIME
IN NICHE
MARKETS
The Church family
operate a huge
enterprise by aiming at
market niches
By Keith Roulston
Dr. Robert Church
enough for Walmart to have any
interest in. That market has more
flexibility."
Getting a piece of the
entertainment value of food can mean
changing the way a producer thinks
about his operation, Church says.
Farmers are usually interested in
controlling their input costs and
maximizing production but aren't
interested in the processing,
manufacturing, distribution and sales
aspects of the agricultural value
chain. But the real bottom line is
strategic alliances, Church said.
The Church operation is involved
in the Future Beef branded beef
operation based in the U.S. which has
180,000 cows, two feedlots, two
backgrounders and an identity
preserved product. Safeway food
stores has taken an equity position in
this system and sells the product on
its shelves.
Church said in a vertical co-
operation system all links of the
chain pool their costs and divide up
the additional profit gained.
"People say you'll end up with
corporate farming," Church said, but
Targe corporate farms like
Bakersfield Land and Cattle
Company in California have had no
more success in managing huge
farming operations than the
communists in the Soviet Union had,
he said.
"There's only one person that has
the interest, the ability and the
intuitive `stick-to-itedness' to handle
the top side of the food chain — the
independent farmer."
But there are some things in the
food chain that farmers have not
traditionally been good at, he said,
including the identification, pursuit
and execution of value-added growth
in the food chain.
"To get into the bottom end of the
entertainment food business you need
partners," Church said. Farmers often
have a relationship with the processor
but not necessarily with the marketer
and the distributor. To be part of that
partnership it's absolutely essential to
have an auditable food safety
program, he said.
"For the life of me I can't imagine
why there are a lot of cattle producers
who don't see the value of the cattle
identification program," he said. "It's
just an adaptation of your
management system."
The Church operation gets
involved in alliances that reverse the
food chain flow to add value to the
farm gate product, he said. If the
retailer and processor want things
like special genetics or special feeds,
there's a bargaining process.
"What you hear from various
processors or retailers is `If you do
this for us we can do this for you,
then we can total our costs and split
the returns'," he said. "However
that's not normally the way it's
presented to you. Normally it's
presented to you: `If you produce
this, then we can sell more product'.
They fail to add the bottom line. The
bottom line is where you get a share
of that market. That's really key."
The restaurant industry, for
instance, which has the highest
margins in the food chain, demands
the processor change to meet their