“People, you have to look at the numbers if you’re going to survive.”

Those were the introductory words of Vita Plus’s Gary Sipiorski at the recent Four-State Dairy Nutrition and Management Conference.

Specifically, Sipiorski broke down the characteristics of farms that do the best during tough financial times.

“Top producers are always asking why,” Sipiorski emphasized. Further those individuals know how to take care of cattle, grow and buy high-quality feed, understand their financials, and understand how to take care of their help.

Not an easy task
No doubt being the best is a tall order, and dairy farmers by and large have chased that goal fervently. From 1993 to 2018, only one livestock species gained productivity at a faster rate than dairy. According to Sipiorski, swine productivity grew 68 percent in that time frame, while dairy expanded 44 percent and broilers 43 percent.

Given that information additional and continued improvement, farms must know where they’re at and where they’re headed.