“The Business Conference is a big deal. The educational events cover all of dairying. It’s about more than just managing cows - you get information on industry regulations, employee management, legislation, and all kinds of different topics,” said dairy farm owner Ken Feltz, of Feltz Family Farms in Stevens Point, Wis.

Sessions for dairy producers looking to boost their business and financial acumen or human resources and people-management skills should attend:

• Dairy futures and options – what have we learned? Dairy farmers Steve Schalla and Jay Binversie along with commodity broker Carl Babler will share both positive and negative experiences with using milk futures and options for contracting milk with processing plants.

• Say What? Tools for tough family business conversations. Prepare for handling even the most difficult conversations in a family business with best practices and strategies from family business consultants Nicole Bettinger and Barb Dartt, DVM.

• Activity-based management: Taking your management to the next level. Learn how three dairy farmers have worked toward tracking cost and performance of each activity on their farm. The panel of Calvin Moody, Dale Hemminger and J.P. Rhea will be facilitated by Jason Karszes of Cornell University.

• Winning in tough times. Identify financial weaknesses and learn steps to increase income and lower costs in this focused session presented by Dr. Mike Boehlje, Purdue University.

• What can we do to make a buck? Dr. Mike Hutjens, world-renowned dairy extension specialist,will share five “must-do” items along with five “don’t even consider” items to improve volumes and manage costs.

• Rising labor costs: strategies and approaches. Get insights on the five most critical management areas that impact labor costs in a session led by Jason Karszes.

• Honor your family. Do the business right. Learn lessons from farm families who have successfully managed farm transition and business management with award-winning professional speaker Jolene Brown.

• Kick bottlenecks aside to find margins. Ohio State professor, Dr. Bill Weiss, will share how maximizing income over feed costs, not just minimizing feed costs, is key to the margins and productivity your dairy needs.

• Q&A with Basse. Ag economist Dan Basse will answer your questions and go in-depth about market situations and scenarios.

• Business analysis: measuring costs to improve performance. Take a look around your farm to see what activities can be measured, and how that information can be used to make effective management changes. Session will be led by dairy farmer Kyle Getty and Jason Karszes.

• Milk processor contracts: the fine print matters. Learn what to look for in your processor agreement and how to sort through the fine print in a session led by attorney Troy Schneider.

Additional sessions on cost management, succession planning, hiring practices and personal leadership will be held on the Learning Lounge stages in the Hall of Ideas trade show.

The 2018 PDPW Business Conference will feature a world-class lineup of more than 40 speakers to share insights in over 50 keynotes, breakouts, specialty sessions and hands-on “Dive in and Discover” workshops. The “Hall of Ideas” will feature more than 200 vendors displaying the latest technologies and services for today’s producers and will include a series of “Learning Lounge” sessions and the “Preview Stage” highlighting new research being conducted by UW-Madison Master and PhD students.

Conference details and registration information is available at www.pdpw.org/businessconference/ or contact PDPW at 1-800-947-7379.

Professional Dairy Producers (PDPW) is the nation's largest dairy producer-led organization of its kind, focusing on producer professionalism, stakeholder engagement and unified outreach to share ideas, solutions, resources and experiences that help dairy producers succeed."