CALF_News_June_July_2021

37 CALF News • June | July 2021 • www.calfnews.net By Burt Rutherford Contributing Editor hat we’re doing here is a call to arms for everybody to start waking up. Start waking up our associations and start waking up beef producers.” That’s Andrew Timmer- man’s take on the current state of the beef business as he watches synthetic meat make inroads into the real beef market. Timmerman, owner of the Timmerman Feeding Company feedyard near Sterling, Colo., got his wake-up call one morn- ing driving to work. The news announced that Colorado's Gov. Polis had declared March 20 as Meat-Out Day in the state. That hit hard. And that’s when Timmerman decided to hit back. His counter punches are two billboards now on display in Denver and Fort Collins, two rapidly growing cities along Colorado’s Front Range that are home to millions of Genera- tion X, Y and Zers – those born since 1965. The message to consumers is simple – real beef is real; fake beef is fake. The message to his fellow beef producers is equally as simple – it’s time to step up. “We’re not really defending ourselves against synthetic meat,” he says. “And it’s our job as an industry to tell them the truth. I see probably two synthetic meat commercials a night when I’m watching TV.” That’s compared to very little consumer-facing beef ads. Lest beef producers think fake meat is just a passing fad, Timmerman points to the grocery store dairy case and the amount of fake dairy there. One of his feedyard customers is a developer and almond grower in California. Timmerman told him that with all the promotion of almond milk, the almond business must be really good. His customer replied that almond milk has had no impact on almond prices. That’s because there are just enough almonds in there to call it “almond milk.” The rest is water and chemicals. “I don’t want to go the way of the milk business,” he says. “When they came out with that synthetic milk, they [dairy producers] didn’t stick up for themselves.” Fighting Back In addition to launching his billboard project, Timmerman also was the driving force behind 10 food trucks serving beef at the state capitol on March 20, thanks to donations from farm- ers and ranchers. “We fed 1,250 people. A lot of people asked us a lot of good questions. And we answered them truthfully. And they were astounded.” What’s more, three Denver TV stations covered the event. “They gave a fair representation of what we’re doing against the vegetarians and vegans and the plant-based food. Pretty much what we said came across – let the consumer decide instead of letting the government dictate.” Timmerman says that by and large, beef producers don’t introduce themselves to consumers. “We need to get to these urban areas because everybody is so far removed from their food anymore that they don’t understand it,” he says. “And I get it myself. I concentrate on my business and trying to make the best product in the world. But we forget about the whole picture out there.” And lest you fear that getting closer to your consumer opens you up to attack as the big, bad polluter who is destroying the planet, consider this story: “My father and uncle went to Har- vard because a good friend is a Harvard professor” who invited the pair to visit with a group of students. However, his father and uncle were hesitant to accept the invitation, fearing they were going to walk into a hostile environment. “They said the students were very receptive. They were uneducated on what exactly the beef industry does, compared to what they read on the internet.” Billboard Battling Advertising on TV costs money. A lot of money. The fake meat companies have that advantage because they have multi- billionaires investing in their business. But beef producers have what the fake meat companies and their billionaires can only wish for, and that’s sure-enough, A Call to Arms If Beef Producers Want to Do Something About Fake Meat, Beef Producers Need to Step Up “W Continued on page 39 