As the beef industry descends on Music City this week, the Farm Journal team is on location to bring you the insights that can impact your bottom line.
With nearly 80 Cattlemen’s College, Learning Lounge and Cattle Chat educational sessions, three general sessions and more than 7 acres of trade show with the latest in equipment, technology, pharmaceuticals and feed supplements, covering CattleCon is not for the faint at heart.
To help us provide a producer’s perspective, we’ve invited five CattleCon attendees to be our boots on the ground and help us capture highlights from their experiences in Nashville.
Providing real-world insights to sessions and talks on the trade show floor will be:
- A first-time CattleCon attendee, Jenna Fitzsimmons, from Cunningham, Kan.
- Rachel Gray of Little Timber Farms, Blackduck, Minn., who specializes in developing heifers, is attending her fifth convention.
- Ken Odde, South Dakota commercial cow-calf producer from Pollock, who has attended more than 30 NCBA Conventions and Trade Shows.
- Commercial cow-calf producer Logan Pribbeno of Wine Glass Ranch, Imperial, Neb., will be attending his third CattleCon this year and is bringing his entire family to experience the event.
- Kim Rounds, Five Rivers manager of talent acquisition and social media, is looking forward to her seventh CattleCon.
To kick off their CattleCon coverage, we asked the group to share why they are looking forward to this year’s event and why they chose to invest their time and money to travel to Nashville.
Q: What are you looking forward to at CattleCon?
Fitzsimmons: I am looking forward to expanding my knowledge about the industry, seeing NCBA in action at the convention and networking with other U.S. producers.
Gray: I’m really looking forward to networking — meeting and seeing people I haven’t seen in a year. But in particular, as I was looking through the Cattlemen’s College sessions, I am really interested in the nutrition sessions, particularly the session on heifer development. If I can come away with some tips and tricks to bring home just to make our operation even more successful, that’s what I go for.
Odde: I always anticipate the trade show and finding new technologies. I enjoy that.
Pribbeno: We are looking forward to seeing Nashville, trying some new cuisine. We are bringing our two children as well, so exposing them to CattleCon.
Rounds: Seeing industry friends and connections and hearing directly what the biggest topics and issues are.
Q: What is on your radar regarding hot topics to be discussed?
Fitzsimmons: Trade, disease and identification will be just a few of the hot topics.
Gray: I think markets are going to be a hot topic. Will the markets hold? What is CattleFax going to give as the outlook? That is always a really well-attended session. People look forward to that analysis of not only where we’ve been in the cattle industry, but what do the professionals see where we are headed. New technology will also be a hot topic, whether it is GPS tracking, fencing things or other uses of AI. I think we’re going to see a lot of that, both on the trade show floor and in the sessions.
Odde: I’m a big fan of letting the free market work. If I have any opportunity to influence policy, I’m a big supporter of the free market and keeping government out of our business.
Rounds: New World screwworm, imports, exports, immigration and the grain/weather outlook.
Q: What do you hope to learn from the event?
Fitzsimmons: I am hoping to learn more about industry issues, consumer trends and production innovation. One Cattlemen’s College session I am looking forward to most is “How to Lead Through Adversity” with John Sachse from Ranchfit.
Gray: My goal is to always learn something new. There’s a Cattlemen’s College session that has to do with heifer development and nutrition. I’m looking forward to going to that one. Another one called “Bigger Cattle, Bigger Decisions: Managing the Health and Welfare of Cattle.” I think there’s a lot of value in those sessions.
Odde: As a rancher, we’re always interested in things that might help improve our business and make us more profitable. So, we’re always looking for those kinds of opportunities.
Pribbeno: The Cattlemen’s College line up is looking promising. We plan to attend several of those sessions. And, of course, the one I would never miss is the CattleFax outlook.
Rounds: I like learning about things that weren’t even on my radar! It’s fun to stumble upon information I didn’t know I didn’t know.
Q: Why do you go to CattleCon?
Fitzsimmons: I think it is important to attend your state and national conventions to be involved. These organizations are run by producers for producers. It is vital to show up as much as possible at meetings to have one’s voice heard. No one speaks better for you than you. Change starts with the producer.
Gray: My feeling is, if I walk away with one new nugget of knowledge that I can bring home and change something on our ranch to make it better, it is completely worth my time.
Odde: It’s a way of staying attuned with the cattle industry, and, well, probably even more broadly, the beef industry. I always enjoyed the CattleFax presentation — it’s always been one of the highlights for me.
Pribbeno: The networking and meeting new friends is the main draw for me.
Rounds: To network and see all industry parts and opinions in one place. It’s rare to see that many producers and decision makers in one place, so it’s a hard event to miss.
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