Alan Bjerga: Hello, and welcome to Dairy Defined. A dairy farmer’s work is never done, and in some cases, part of that work is advocating for the industry on Capitol Hill.
NMPF is having its fly-in next month, but some farmers are already getting a headstart. Joining us today are Frank Doll, he’s the chairman of Prairie Farms with an operation near Greenville, Illinois, and Lauren Schwartzbeck of Union Bridge, Maryland, a member of Maola Local Dairies and a school teacher. And let’s hold that thought for just a moment. Thank you for joining us.
Frank Doll: Hey-
Lauren Schwartzbeck: … thank you.
Frank Doll: Thanks for having us. Looking forward to it.
Alan Bjerga: I want to start with you, Lauren, because the school year’s winding down, kids are getting antsy, and here you are in Washington, DC. Maybe you’re experiencing some relief. What brings you to Washington?
Lauren Schwartzbeck: I’m here to talk about flavored milk in school and the benefits that it has for us. It’s a nice little break from 90 eighth graders and two toddlers of my own. So I’m ready to kick back, relax, but also speak in a positive way about all the benefits and good things we have out there in our dairy industry.
Alan Bjerga: Maybe off mic we can talk about the relative maturity levels of the lawmakers versus the eighth graders. I’d be interested in how you feel about this when this is all over. But in all seriousness though, Congress milk and schools had a big milestone this year with the passage of the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act. Let’s talk about that first before we get into flavored milk. What will that mean for your students’ nutrition and how do you see whole milk playing out in schools?
Lauren Schwartzbeck: I think it’s great. I think it’s awesome that students and kids have a choice. Giving them more choices just gets more milk out there for them and the benefits that it has and the flavor that it has that kids enjoy. I think by giving them those choices and by providing that product to them can only do great things, not only just for our dairy industry, but for these kids as well with the health benefits that it has.
Alan Bjerga: But Frank, you hear Lauren talk about the many flavors and the great flavor of the whole milk. It’s not the only flavor. You’re looking at this from a different direction as the chairman of a dairy cooperative that’s pretty active on school nutrition issues. Where do you see whole milk falling in the full range of milk offerings that are available for kids?
Frank Doll: That’s a great question. I think it’s a big compliment to what the chocolate milk in schools… That’s the driver. I mean, everybody wants chocolate milk, but having whole milk there instead of skim milk is just a great alternative.
And I shouldn’t say an alternative, another choice we can have on the menu for kids. And our sales, I’m sure all co-ops are this way, we sell a lot more whole milk than we do skim milk now and that is continuing to go up, and skim milk falling off the table. 2%’s still the winner. But if we have chocolate for kids in school and then you have whole milk as an option, because that’s a lot of what they’re getting at home now is whole milk and we’re ecstatic about that, and we want to do anything we can to create another generation of whole milk drinkers, and that’ll drive sales for the next 10, 20, 30 years.
I think we could get those kids hooked on it, and what really good milk is instead of fat-free.
Alan Bjerga: Lauren, Frank’s raising an important point here. To get milk’s nutrition benefits to kids, you need a lot of entry points and that means a lot of varieties of milk. As someone who is working with eighth graders, seeing the lunch trays, knowing what the experience is, what role do you see the flavored varieties playing on actual school lunch trays?
Lauren Schwartzbeck: I think it’s a huge role. Without those varieties, I think you’re going to see kids shift to different options for drink choices. And unfortunately, I think some of those aren’t going to be milk if that option is not there. So the benefit of just giving those kids the ability to make a choice and a choice that’s healthy for them and a choice that has flavor and it has the wholesomeness that we grew up with, is huge for our industry and huge for our kids.
Alan Bjerga: So you’re talking about the difference maybe being between a variety, say a chocolate milk versus an a la carte beverage with a lot less nutrition.
Lauren Schwartzbeck: Yes, absolutely. I think it’s important for our kids to know that what is going in their body has a direct effect on them and that milk is a healthy option for them that has many nutritional benefits that will last a lifetime with them compared to some other options that they may be more enticed to if that option of different flavors is not there.
Alan Bjerga: And Frank, you are the chairman of a co-op that is doing processing, that is working with things like formulation, looking at… The chocolate milk that maybe you and I were drinking as kids isn’t the same as the chocolate milk that’s going to schools now. Could you explain some of the challenges and some of the innovations we’ve seen in that space in recent years?
Frank Doll: I think the sugar content is the big thing, we’re trying to bring that down. And chocolate in itself, the additive, chocolate is… Sometimes the price rolls. I mean, just buying chocolate during the pandemic got hard and the price had to go up just from the chocolate part of it. And then I was thinking about that question too. When I was a kid, growing up, chocolate milk was the… That’s the only time you got it was at school. We just drank white milk at home and you only got chocolate, it was like a treat at school and it was a great… It was cold and it was something you really look forward to. And I think kids still do that.
I think as our co-op, we are trying to bring the sugar level down, but the product’s still going to taste good. If it doesn’t taste good, you’re not going to sell it.
And we got to be able to sell to kids in school what they can go purchase at the store or the convenience store, or wherever their next, be it online, wherever they’re going to buy milk from. We want them to have a good experience in school and then they’ll go, “Hey, I need to buy some of this so I can have it at home during the summer, at night, weekends, whatever it is,” working on those milk drinkers for years to come.
Alan Bjerga: What I hear both of you saying is that kids’ choices for school nutrition doesn’t occur in a vacuum. There are other beverages that are competing with them. There are other things that they may be able to consume, and at some point you got to meet the consumers where they are.
Lauren Schwartzbeck: And I think it’s so important that we got whole milk or we’re working to get all these schools to get whole milk back in the school building because for so long, many of these students have never experienced whole milk.
Some of these kids, all they know, the only milk they get is in school. So I think for these kids to really finally get a taste of that, I think it’s going to be hopefully a generational thing where they’re like, “Yeah, we were the first kids to get whole milk back in schools.” And then it’s something they can talk about with their kids in the future and kind of really sell the point that it is good. Milk is good for you, but it also tastes good as well.
Alan Bjerga: We’ve been focusing a lot on nutrition today. You are on Capitol Hill, you’re talking to lawmakers, a lot of things. Is nutrition an area where when you’re engaging on Capitol Hill, you find a message that is resonating.
I mean, you talk a lot about stuff in your meetings, but most members of Congress don’t deal with the same day-to-day realities as a dairy farmer, but they all eat. Many of them have kids. Is this a way that a farmer can connect? And if so, what’s the big thing you want to say to them?
Frank Doll: Well, yes, I think on the connecting with kids, I think that’s an easy way in. And I think, I’m pretty confident that they’re aware that milk is safe. I mean, it’s always safe. It’s going to be good. It’s just got to… The nutritional part, I think we just need to plug in a little bit and give it a plug for it. But I think it’s just, we’re setting a tone for their kids.
One of my little fun things when I talk about whole milk with teachers or when I have field trips at my farm, “Well, what do you think, how much butterfat’s in whole milk? Skim is zero, 1%’s one, 2% is two. How much butterfat’s in whole milk?” Just a fun little game. And I get everything from five to 95% or 85. Nobody has any idea. And you tell them it’s 3.25 and they’re like, “Holy cow, that’s it? That’s the only difference?”
I said, “Yeah, it’s just a little bit.” So I think that’s something that resonates, I think, with people when you give them that little scenario there. Let’s play how much butterfat’s actually in whole milk.
Lauren Schwartzbeck: I think too, as a dairy farmer, being able to speak about your farm, your family, the hands that made this product, and those congressmen and everyone on Capitol Hill being able to put a face to the name or even just know that we’re out there speaking on behalf of just milk in general, just knowing who we are and what we do, and why we’re so passionate about it, it is nothing but positive for our dairy industry because sometimes some of the choices they make have a huge impact on the livelihood of dairy farms in our world.
Alan Bjerga: We’ve been speaking with Lauren Schwartzbeck of Union Bridge, Maryland, a member of Maola Local Dairies and a schoolteacher, and Frank Doll, the Chairman of the Prairie Farms Dairy Cooperative. Before we let you go, Frank, we mentioned earlier that next month is NMPF’s fly-in and you are a member of NMPF’s executive committee. Could you give us a sneak preview of what Prairie’s priorities as dairy farmers descend on Washington next month?
Frank Doll: School milk’s a huge part of our business and we want to keep it that way. And so I think that’s a big part of our stuff. And then we also have immigration, that’s still a little bit of a challenge for us, and different farmers in different parts of our area that they want those workers. And so we’re trying to help national milk [inaudible 00:09:58] bill policy and trying to work on that.
There’s lots of things, like the DMC program. I’m getting off the track here a little bit, but DMC, it’s a good program, but it didn’t really work too well for us again this year because everything else is so expensive and the price of the feed didn’t come up, but everything else did. So there’s things there that we can get better at, always trying to help steer the ship in the right direction.
Alan Bjerga: And Lauren, when is school getting out in your county?
Lauren Schwartzbeck: May 29.
Alan Bjerga: What county are you in in Maryland?
Lauren Schwartzbeck: I actually teach in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. So we get out early.
Alan Bjerga: Yeah. Over in Montgomery County, Maryland, we’re going till the day before Juneteenth. It’ll be June 18th. Thank you Snow Creek Storm. Frank, Lauren, thank you so much for your time.
Frank Doll: Thank you. Thanks, Al.
Alan Bjerga: And that’s it for the Dairy Defined Podcast. If you want to know more about NMPF’s efforts, you can go to our website, nmpf.org/subscribe. And for more of these podcasts, all you have to do is go to the NMPF website or go to Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music, and search under the podcast named Dairy Defined. Thank you for joining us.
