Developing a Pasture-Raised, Iowa Based Meat Company – 2021 Virtual Annual Conference

Three market-savvy livestock farmers are creating 99 Counties – an Iowa-based meat company focused on pasture-raised meats. Join Matt LeRoux, meat marketing specialist, and three farmer entrepreneurs at the roundtable. This session aims to foster collaboration between livestock producers to guide the business development and product procurement process for 99 Counties.

• Matt LeRoux has nearly 20 years of experience serving farms through Cornell Cooperative Extension, non-profits and consulting. Specializing in market strategy, Matt works with a diverse mix of produce and livestock farmers, and food businesses. Career highlights include developing the Marketing Channel Assessment Tool for produce growers and the Cornell Meat Price & Yield Calculator.
• Nick Wallace is a farmer, entrepreneur and lifetime member of PFI with 15 years of experience in various forms of pasture-raised and grass-fed meat marketing. Nick owns and operates Wallace Farms near Keystone, Iowa, selling his own meat and other farmers’ meats over the internet.
• Wendy Johnson and Johnny Rafkin own Joia Food Farm, a regenerative, organic farm producing humanely-raised meat and eggs near Charles City, Iowa. Wendy is also PFI’s current board president.
• Caleb Baker is a beginning farmer in Ringgold County, Iowa, who is transitioning from farming conventional row crops and feedlot cattle to developing perennial pastures and grass finishing. Caleb is interested in developing an internet marketing platform for grass-finished beef raised by graziers in southwest Iowa.