This morning I gave a tour of my dairy farm to some folks from the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board. They were grocery store deli managers and retailers who have a passion for dairy foods, but most of them hadn’t been on a farm before. We took them to the barns and to the milking parlor and explained how pure, wholesome milk starts with healthy animals. As with most things, prevention is the key. That means a good, healthy environment for the animals, quality feed and regular veterinary care.
As far as milking goes, it’s all about consistency. Cows are sensitive animals, and every cow wants to be milked the same way three times a day, every day. I explained to our visitors that milking cows is just like baking or preparing a recipe – there are no shortcuts. You don’t deviate, and you don’t skip a step.
Pure milk begins with healthy cows
To keep our milking protocols at the highest level, we have meetings and trainings for our employees. We talk about how we can improve, and we review and re-emphasize our standards of animal care and our procedures. When employees see that these things are important to us, they become important to them too.
Our employees are highly trained
The best thing about taking visitors on the farm tour is that it opens their eyes to how much we care about quality: the quality of our animal care, the quality of our milking procedures, the quality of our employee training. And all of that leads to the final product: the quality of our milk.
