The Passion of Grass Run Farms

“We’re in pro­duc­tion; we’re not just a mar­ket­ing com­pany,” Kristine Jepsen told Organic Connections. “It takes coop­er­a­tion and understanding—literally on the ground—among pro­duc­ers to make this thing work. It’s really grat­i­fy­ing and sus­tain­ing when you are able to answer ques­tions and help some­one come into your market.”

Growing the Business

Prior to open­ing Grass Run Farms, the Jepsens had been sus­tain­ably con­scious for a num­ber of years. “We both came out of the first flush of zeal for back-to-land ethics for food,” Kristine said. “We both lived through the offi­cial stamp of USDA Organic. My hus­band had worked on a cou­ple of organic veg­etable farms in col­lege sort of as an intern. And then I’m a gar­dener by nature; both sets of my grand­par­ents had turn-of-the-century self-sustaining farms. So that whole idea was under­stood by me, but it didn’t really cod­ify into some­thing we could actu­ally do for a liv­ing until we sold a lit­tle bit here and then sold a bit more.”

That increas­ing “more,” the Jepsens found, quickly exceeded what they them­selves were able to pro­vide. “We didn’t invent the grass-fed indus­try; it’s been around for 10 or 15 years,” Kristine con­tin­ued. “But it’s really just taken shape since it’s got­ten more national press in terms of the rea­son for pre­fer­ring or for pick­ing out grass-fed. That cre­ated a mar­ket oppor­tu­nity for pro­duc­ers who were lean­ing that way or who could prof­itably raise grass-fed beef.

“We saw how we could par­tic­i­pate in the indus­try, and at the same time decided to shore up a mar­ket that required more ani­mals than we were pro­duc­ing. We found ways to intro­duce pro­duc­ers and say, ‘Could you do this, this and this, and in return we’ll con­tract your cat­tle or we’ll buy your calves and find some­place for them to go that meets all these stan­dards?’ We just added one pro­ducer here, one pro­ducer there, and built it into a grow­ing year-round supply.”

Adhering to Standards

Because Grass Run Farms is not only a busi­ness but a pas­sion, the Jepsens have set high stan­dards for the prod­ucts they sell. “Grass-fed means that the ani­mal has never received grain or starch, because that’s not what the cat­tle rumen is designed to digest,” Kristine said. “They are not given antibi­otics or hor­mones, and they have pas­ture access.”

In addi­tion, the Jepsens insist on healthy soils and man­ag­ing pas­tures that sequester tons of atmos­pheric carbon.

Leading by Example

The Jepsens are quite aware of their Midwestern neigh­bors who are con­ven­tion­ally rais­ing beef and pork. But they have found that lead­ing by example—rather than direct opposition—is a far bet­ter way of accom­plish­ing their mission.

“On the sur­face, it would seem an ‘us ver­sus them’ dis­cus­sion,” Kristine explained. “But the reign­ing men­tal­ity of the com­mod­ity mar­kets that exist here tends toward ‘every­one in agri­cul­ture is in agri­cul­ture.’ There is a cer­tain under­stand­ing, and you really don’t get very far say­ing, ‘We’re doing some­thing right and you’re doing some­thing wrong.’ It’s more an approach of demon­strat­ing the advan­tages of a new and emerg­ing mar­ket, or a dif­fer­ent per­spec­tive on agri­cul­ture, or a dif­fer­ent food ethic.

Click any image to enlarge.

“If you have some suc­cess, or some tech­nique you are using works or pans out in the face of what peo­ple thought might hap­pen, even­tu­ally they’re just inter­ested. The ques­tions start get­ting asked, and infor­ma­tion begins cir­cu­lat­ing. Eventually some­one will ask, ‘What would it take for me to pro­duce for you?’ That’s where the con­ver­sa­tion starts.”

Outreach

In set­ting that exam­ple, the Jepsens use their own facil­ity. “We gen­er­ally have an open-gate pol­icy,” Kristine said, “although it’s bet­ter if we can arrange tours and vis­its in advance. We then have the time to show exam­ples of what we do and tell more about what vis­i­tors are look­ing at.

“We also host a cou­ple of dif­fer­ent edu­ca­tional events over the course of the year, usu­ally dur­ing the grow­ing sea­son when it’s green or when peo­ple want to see some­thing hav­ing to do with rota­tional graz­ing or infrastructure.

“About every other year we have some kind of farm party or some kind of more social event that brings peo­ple out. The root of it is, ‘Where does food come from? What final prod­uct do these dif­fer­ent claims and pro­duc­tion prac­tices result in? Why should I care about it?’ Many times the deci­sion to buy is eco­nomic, but there is some­thing to the idea of account­abil­ity and know­ing where our food comes from, and that con­sumers do have a choice in the market.”

Kristine, who is a writer by train­ing and nature, also reg­u­larly blogs on the sub­ject of com­monly asked ques­tions about her industry.

Sustainable Legacy

“I think that a lot of agri­cul­ture has the sense that very large, very anony­mous ver­ti­cal inte­gra­tion is kind of scary to the indi­vid­ual pro­ducer,” Kristine con­cluded. “Having an alter­na­tive in the mar­ket­place is fun­da­men­tal cap­i­tal­ism, but it’s also com­fort­ing and inspir­ing. If we’re able to offer that alter­na­tive to another pro­ducer, that’s very mean­ing­ful, and it’s a big part of what we do.

“We’re doing some­thing in which we believe, which impacts the qual­ity of food we are pro­duc­ing as well as the envi­ron­men­tal legacy that it has the poten­tial to leave behind.”

For more infor­ma­tion, please visit www.grassrunfarms.com.