IBC2000-5 Marketing

Farm Gating:  "Selling the Sizzle, Not Just the Steak"

Les Ross
Prairie Buffalo Farms
Taber, AB Canada

The following article was originally presented at the International Bison Conference in Edmonton, Alberta in August 2000.  The conference covered a wide array of bison topics including production, marketing, genetics, history and much more.  This article has been reprinted with the permission of the IBC2000 Chairman.

Abstract

Prairie Buffalo is located along a major highway in Southern Alberta.  The Ross family manages a modest herd of Bison that has developed into a very active meat marketing and by-product business.  Len shared his commitment to personalized customer service, a quality, totally natural product, and an obsession with appearance-presentation.  The content suggested that today’s' major marketers are indebted to the "farm-gaters" who created and sustained our national bison markets.

Introduction

I had a boyhood dream to own a Buffalo.  It became an ambition in retirement, to replace a small, cattle, hobby-farm with a "few" of the mighty beasts.  In 1979, a grisly old cattle buyer found two teenaged, but bred, Custer-type cows and delivered them to our farm in the dark of night. The hobby calved into a herd that soon  mandated the need for an outlet to contain their numbers.  Twenty years later, much of our retirement is consumed with moving animals to slaughter, processing and packaging, filling orders, meeting with customers and delivering our meat and other bison products.  Two farmers have become l'entrepreneurs who enjoy every minute of helping people to enjoy the best of  this Great Provider.

Presentation

Bertha and Bridgette, now well into their 30's have produced 32 calves between them.  Our herd, except for some outside bull power, is totally composed of their offspring.

The herd, typically Custer in appearance, is maintained at about 50 cows, with the best heifer calves going as breeding stock and the bulls and culls into the food chain.

Our entry into marketing was a response to visitors who were anxious to taste Buffalo meat and its total absence in the market place.  A few steaks and roasts in the top of the fridge soon became a three-freezer inventory and a steady routine of butchering, and order filling.

We moved between processors until we found one who shared our interest in producing a top quality, attractively packaged, and fairly priced products.

Our marketing strategy grew out of two revelations, both were appropriate captions on an old Marilyn Monroe calendar:

"It not only has to Be Good, it has to Look Good", ......and she did.

"Sell the Sizzle, not just the Steak",.......and you can muse around that one.

These, over the years  provided us with a reputation that, without paid advertising, markets our products.  Our promotion overhead is two hand painted signs that grace our front drive and announce the availability of "packaged Buffalo Meat".

In recent years, the farm sales have expanded to the serving of a very select group of outlets whose consumption just neatly balances out all of our production.  This expansion resulted from an association with a Natural Foods marketer who specialized in open range turkeys, chickens, pigs and lambs, their own grass-fed beef and now Bison: the jewel in her marketing crown.  

Our entry into this market resulted from a rather unorthodox event that found us barbequing buffalo burgers for several chefs and produce buyers from some of our Province's most up-scale hotels and Natural food markets.  The event was staged on a remote, prairie ranch on a windless, hot spring afternoon.  The guests quaffed good wine, drank micro brews and sampled many, simply prepared "Natural" foods.

We talked meat qualities, gentle handling procedures, considerate slaughter procedures, and meticulous food handling, storage, and shipping practices.

We spent the day "Selling the Sizzle" of some great nutritional products in a setting that not only "Looked Good" but  was "Good".

Within a few days, doors started to open and the calls have yet to diminish in numbers and frequency. 

Summary

We produce the best red meat product in the world and there is an anxious and very hungry market out there on which we have yet to scratched the surface.

We have the animals, the environment, the historic nostalgia, and an unbelievably great product.  If you can inject your love for the animal, your knowledge of its qualities, and your down-on-the-farm personality into the process, your greatest service to all man-kind, would be to put the best of what we produce on each of their tables