Trade Show Shake-Up: IPPE Insights & The Future of Pork Events

In this episode, Casey and Morgan take you inside the 2025 International Production & Processing Expo (IPPE) and recent pork industry trade shows to uncover key trends, challenges, and game-changing innovations. 

🔹 IPPE Highlights – Exclusive interviews with industry leaders on biosecurity, digital flock management, gut health, and innovative feed additives
🔹 Pork Show Trends – Why attendance was down, and how we can rethink these events
🔹 Biosecurity & Disease Prevention – Lessons from poultry that swine producers can learn from
🔹 Feed & Nutrition Innovations – New products launched at IPPE and their potential impact 

Special Guests from IPPE:
🎤 Dr. Alexander Strauch (Four Star Veterinarian Services) – Biosecurity & disease mitigation in poultry​
🎤 Jordyn Studer (Barentz) – The launch of Kolin Plus & feed additive innovations​
🎤 Nathan Hillis (Profile Animal Health) – Dust mitigation, litter amendments & biosecurity advancements​
🎤 Tommi Timoharju (Alimetrics) – Advancements in gut health diagnostics & rapid AI-driven testing​ 

Key Takeaway: Whether it’s rethinking pork trade shows or embracing digital transformation in poultry, the industry is evolving—are we keeping up? 

🎧 Listen Now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify & all major platforms! 
🔗 https://www.buzzsprout.com/admin/1931482/episodes/16696608-trade-show-shake-up-ippe-insights-the-future-of-pork-events 

💬 What’s your take on the future of trade shows? Are they still valuable, or do they need a revamp? Comment below! 

#IPPE #PorkIndustry #TradeShowTrends #Agriculture #SwineIndustry #Biosecurity #PoultryIndustry #CoffeeInTheBarn 

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Transcript

Casey Bradley
0:00:00
Well, today's episode is a special edition. What I'd like to do is go around and interview different people and give you some insights about the trade shows. Well, starting in January, it becomes trade show season. If you're in the swine industry, you get to start out with Banff, one of my favorite places to go. But no, I didn't go this year. And then you're followed with Iowa Pork, IPPE, Minnesota Pork, and then the list goes on of all the different states out there. And so there's a lot that happens at these trade shows. And I always get questions. What was it like? Who was there? What was the vibe? And so I want to share with you four interviews I did from IPPE. If you'd rather watch the interview on the video format, you can get that on our YouTube channel, Coffee in the Barn podcast.

Casey Bradley
0:01:03
But I also want to share it on audio in case you're driving like me and this is when you get to listen to things. But I really want to thank our sponsors for these special interviews at IPPE and that's Profile Animal Health. They went above and beyond, they created the nice little nook for me to record and it was really great. So we're going to start off the first interview with Nathan Hillis with Profile and then we're going to visit with Dr. Alexander Starch with Four Star Veterinarian Group, then Jordan Stutter with Brent's and then end it out with Tommy with Alimentrix for IPPE. And then after

Casey Bradley
0:01:43
that we're gonna talk to Morgan because she attended Iowa Pork with me and Minnesota Pork and we're gonna talk about the lower than usual crowds and why I got snowed out of Missouri Pork. So that's kind of what the special edition on coffee in the barn, so stay tuned. Hello and welcome to IPPE 2025. I am here at the Profile Animal Health

Casey Bradley
0:02:11
booth with Nathan Hillis. Welcome, Nathan. 

Nathan Hillis
0:02:28
Hey, nice to have you with us and I'm glad that we got a chance to sit down, Kasey. Definitely, and tell us what to expect from Profile and give us a little bit of background of Profile and why you're here at a poultry show. Okay, so Profile kind of started about 60 years ago in the clay technologies business, service and sports fields, baseball fields.

Nathan Hillis
0:02:38
Then we kind of moved to the horticulture side and some of the erosion control products. About four years, we've really moved from what we had a feed additive to now we have a litter amendment product. And then this year, I'm really excited to announce we have a new dust mitigation product

Nathan Hillis
0:03:01
as well.

Casey Bradley
0:03:02
Well, explain dust because normally you use water or oil, right? 

Nathan Hillis
0:03:16
Yeah, so if you're using water, you're doing it multiple times a day to mitigate that dust. Our product actually is not an oil-based, it's a plant-based product. You put that product down once a week and it will last, you know, through moderate traffic areas for the entirety of a week. It could last up to two weeks as well. Well, and dust mitigation is probably one of the most important things I found out

Nathan Hillis
0:03:30
from a biosecurity standpoint and having viruses or the dust coming in the barns. Absolutely. As soon as you start to vent that barn, you've got dust from outside coming in. In our world of biosecurity challenges, we always have, that dust mitigation is very important around a farm, especially outside. We mitigate the dust in the house a lot of times by controlling the moisture in our litter, which is what environmental care does. But the DustRx product that we have that we're launching, it really does a great job at mitigating that dust outside.

Casey Bradley
0:03:57
Incredible. So let's talk a little bit more about, it's been two years or more since we connected about, we were talking about mycotoxins and of course the clay. Obviously we have a pretty powerful one in that field with Power Guard in the US or Terrashield internationally, but that's not what I bought first from you.

Nathan Hillis
0:04:24
No, the first thing you bought, you called me and said, hey I got some water in this house, how can I, you know, how can I fix my water problem? How can I fix the mud holes inside the house? And we had, that's where environmental care come in, is we've been

Nathan Hillis
0:04:39
mitigating the moisture on sports fields for years. So that's our strength. So environmental care just kind of plays into our strength. We take our knowledge of mitigating moisture in sports field arenas and putting it inside the house. If we mitigate that moisture, as you well know, then we're mitigating the bacterial growth inside

Casey Bradley
0:04:58
that litter or inside that barn as well. Now, I'm going to warn you, audience, it doesn't fix broken water lines. It is what it is. But we've also since then obviously I tried your product, ended up loving it, facilitated, helped, I don't know if it solved it, I still have broken water lines from mismanagement. But other than that, we've been working together for two years and it's been a fun, exciting relationship. And kind of why did you choose to work with Animistic as your technical support in the industry?

Nathan Hillis
0:05:40
So what Profile does is we care about the industry. We're not just out to sell something. We want to add value to the industry. So we choose to partner with people that have a passion for the industries they serve. And Casey, you align well with that motto. We look at, do you care about the animals?

Nathan Hillis
0:05:59
Are you doing it for the animals? Are you doing it for the money? That's the first question we typically ask people. And I know you will. You're not doing it for the money. You're doing it for the betterment of the industry.

Nathan Hillis
0:06:08
So, that's why we want to be part of that journey. And again, you know, when we talk about fixing the problems with water lines and stuff like that, yes, that's an animal husbandry thing that we educate alongside selling that product to someone.

Nathan Hillis
0:06:23
You know, I walk into a house and I see a drinker line leaking. I'm going to say something about that say you know if you can fix that that's going to help problems. I'm not making any money by doing that but at the end of the day it's helping the industry.

Casey Bradley
0:06:33
Well definitely so obviously we're bringing to the table to go beyond just moisture control, dust control, but potentially ammonia and pathogen control in the litter as well.

Nathan Hillis
0:06:58
So while we offer OMRI-listed organic products such as environmental care, these new relationships you're talking about are very exciting because I think it's going to take products like environmental care to the next level. 

Nathan Hillis
0:07:16
I definitely think it is and we have to think outside of the box. And I would say everybody wants to go in the feed, but we could probably solve a lot of problems if we handle the litter right. And environmental care has shown that so far, but taking that even to the next level, I'm really excited about. I am really fired up about it.

Nathan Hillis
0:07:32
You know, it's kind of like, you know, the PowerGuard product we had when we first started this journey. We're finding new uses for that every day. And you know, I think you and I talked a little about the avian influenza issues in the dairy side and how our product, our power guards, play a role in helping those cows get over those challenges. And that's something that we are very proud that we're able to be part of that.

Nathan Hillis
0:07:56
I wouldn't call it a solution, but actually a product that's, or a program that's actually helping the farmer get those cows over that hurdle of avian influenza. 

Casey Bradley
0:08:29
Yeah, and we're not going to cure or prevent avian influenza, but really it is when that happens, she's a high-performing dairy cow, she's very stressed, and it's part of a solution because a lot of times you'll come down here and it's all about a product and it's really how do you pair, how do you find those partners and that is why I'm excited and a mystic to be working with Profile Animal Health on the next level of solutions for our industry. Absolutely and you know I think it's very

Nathan Hillis
0:08:46
important for industry. I think we're moving towards that organic side through all the industry. So, I'm just tickled that I'm very happy that we're able to be part of that, you know, and we offer every product we offer is an organic product. You know, if you have organic farm, you can use every one of our products. If you're a commercial farm, you can use our products still get benefit out of it as well. So, having a salute a solute or having solutions or having products that can go across a broad range of needs is very important to us and I think it's important for us in the future to continue to kind of promote that

Nathan Hillis
0:09:24
that process or promote that industry of organic production. Well I'm really excited. Thank you.

Nathan Hillis
0:09:32
The show is starting. We better get to work. Absolutely. All right. Thank you, Casey.
Casey Bradley
0:00:00
Well, we're back here at IPPE 2025 and I'm sitting with Dr. Alex Strauch, a fellow Spartan with Four Star Veterinarian Services. So, Alex, welcome to IPPE.

Alexander Strauch
0:00:18
Thank you for having me. Yeah, what brings you down to IPPE? I mean, talk to us about your history here and why you come to IPPE. IPPE for me is the Super Bowl of conferences. We make it an absolute number one priority to be down here every year, at least me or

Alexander Strauch
0:00:36
me plus another one of my veterinarians. So being a private poultry veterinarian providing services to commercial poultry companies, there's a lot of producers here and there's a lot of allied industry here and everything else in between. So, everybody meets here, that's why I'm here and we're here right now.

Casey Bradley
0:00:53
When was your first IPPE? 

Alexander Strauch
0:00:54
Three years ago.

Casey Bradley
0:01:02
Three years ago, only three years.

Alexander Strauch
0:01:03
Yes, I've been practicing for eight years, but I've been in independent private practice for the last three. 

Alexander Strauch
0:01:18
So, obviously, we have a lot of problems going on in the poultry industry. Can you kind of talk about the different challenges your producers are dealing with today? 

Alexander Strauch
0:01:25
I'll keep it short and sweet. I'd say that, specifically in the laying hen industry, over the last year and a half, there's been a significant amount of mitigation measures taken against infectious choriza, which is Avobacterium paragallinarum. It's a bacteria and it is a forever bacteria. So multi-age layer complexes or multi-age pullet complexes, if they have been exposed to choriza, have needed to rethink their vaccination programs. And I've been on the front line of that in the Midwest for about the last two years. And that's choriza. Of course, the big boogeyman in the room is HPAI, highly pathogenic avian influenza. So I'd say 50% of my time, energy, and effort the last couple months has been in preventative measures for clients and re-bolstering our biosecurity programs, not just chemical and

Alexander Strauch
0:02:20
physical but administrative and operational biosecurity measures as well. And let's see here, the third topic that's very interesting to people is the general cage-free transition. So I've cut my teeth in specialty egg production and cage-free laying hen management. And as more and more people either transition their complexes to cage-free or expand into specialty cage-free production, I'm right there alongside them with management and medicine programs to fit

Alexander Strauch
0:02:54
the very new, the very different health and management challenges that affect cage-free

Casey Bradley
0:03:02
laying hens.

Casey Bradley
0:03:03
Yeah, so, obviously, I come from the swine world, you come from the poultry world, we cross paths and work together. What are some of the things you're doing on a biosecurity standpoint from the operations that's changing compared to what we see every day?

Alexander Strauch
0:03:17
Right. In the past, we've always had pretty stringent biosecurity protocols when it comes to employees and visitors. And what we've had to add to these exclusionary biosecurity protocols is not just no poultry contact and no swine contact, but we've actually added cattle exclusionary clauses into our employee

Alexander Strauch
0:03:44
biosecurity contracts. And that also goes for visitors, too. HPAI decided to jump over into, H5 decided to jump over into dairy cattle, obviously, within the last year, and that has completely changed the dynamics of transmission and risk. So, that's one example of an operational measure that we've adapted to recently.

Casey Bradley
0:04:03
Man, that grows my hobbies hard. Someday. .

Casey Bradley
0:04:09
Cost of business. 

Casey Bradley
0:04:12
Yeah, exactly. I'll stick with the cats. I guess what are some opportunities, obviously, you think we talked about the grim, the nasty that we have to deal with, the problems, right? What are some opportunities that you see in the poultry industry?

Alexander Strauch
0:04:27
The one that I'm most excited about, most passionate about is laying hen companies getting on a digital, real-time flock management platform where they can analyze their flock performance data and their metrics either remotely, digital, and as close to real-time as possible. And that is going to be the biggest differentiator of those who succeed and those who fall behind in the next couple of years are those who are amenable to digital clock record systems. They make my job easier, they make me more efficient, and they make management better

Alexander Strauch
0:05:04
at doing what they do on a daily basis. Got to send one, you got to collect your data, got to digitize it, got to centralize it, and then you have to appropriately visualize it and analyze it on either a daily or weekly basis. Weekly at the minimum.

Casey Bradley
0:05:06
So we're on the same page here at Wavelength.

Alexander Strauch
0:05:10
We're big data nerds. Yeah.

Casey Bradley
0:05:21
Data nerds. Well, we can be nerds and like animals. Yes. But, well, I appreciate your time here at IPPE and we look forward to visiting again in the future. Thank you. time here at IPPE and we look forward to visiting again in the future. Thank you.

Alexander Strauch
0:05:32
Thank you for having me.

Casey Bradley
0:00:00
Welcome to IPP 2025 again. I'm here with Jordan with Berentz.

Jordan
0:00:12
Hi.

Casey Bradley
0:00:12
Can you give us a little bit of background of Berentz and the different products you're representing? Yeah.

Jordan
0:00:17
So Berentz is a bead additive company. We are based out of Woodbury, Minnesota. We have a large commodity business up there.

Jordan
0:00:27
We move a lot of phosphate, a lot of sodium bicarb and stuff like that. We have recently been getting more into the value-added products and feed additive space. So we currently have three yeast products, a live yeast, a yeast cell wall, a selenium yeast, a phytase enzyme, and a silanase enzyme. And one of the really cool new products that we're launching is Choline Plus. Choline Plus!

Jordan
0:00:50
It's a greener alternative to choline chloride. Really, really cool. The enthusiasm is warranted. It's a really cool product. So, I've been excited to be a part of that, be a part of that product launch. And yeah, great company.

Casey Bradley
0:01:05
All right. So, audience, I did evaluate Choline Plus and I'm like, it has to come to market. Things didn't align star wise, but now you get to work with the lovely Deri Brown. Oh my gosh.

Jordan
0:01:21
Yeah.

Jordan
0:01:21
I love Deri Brown. She is amazing. Um, couldn't ask for a better boss or a better person to head up our sales and technical, uh, team. So Deri is super awesome. Super fun to work with.

Casey Bradley
0:01:32
And if you didn't know, Deri helped train me on things probably not to do. Maybe not so much things to do, but you know, we had a lot of mixed words over pigs and poop and you name it, but we go way back, but it's really exciting to see Derry with the new team. You got Brian, you're new and fresh.

Jordan
0:01:49
Yeah, I mean six months, six months. 

Casey Bradley
0:01:58
Wow. I know. It's like a yeah, it's clone. six months

Jordan
0:02:05
My first day was May 28th, so like really my first week was at World Pork. Yeah, yeah, I guess. And I guess that's in June, yeah, and we're in

Jordan
0:02:10
and we're poultry, but you know, still got a sport to play. Yeah, it's been fun getting into the swine space a little bit more. So most of my background has obviously been in poultry with my master's in poultry nutrition and then at a previous employer I was more mixed species and did some dairy a little bit of swine and and still really heavy poultry focus but it's been fun to work with Berentz and work with our swine sales guys and work with dairy to get more stuff done on the swine side so yeah yeah it's been a lot

Casey Bradley
0:02:41
of fun. So you still like the feathers? 

Jordan
0:02:44
I love the feathers yeah especially laying hens those are my favorite. 

Casey Bradley
0:02:48
So tell us a little bit more about Colon Plus obviously we're fans and excited but they don't know anything about it.

Jordan
0:02:53
So, Colen Plus is a 100% phytogenic product. It is a very, very pure product that is harvested at a specific time, grown in a specific way to ensure the proper levels of the phytoactives. So, the four phytoactives in the product are curcumin, catechin, which is like a green tea, the phytoactive in green tea, different polyphenols, and then

Jordan
0:03:17
gallic acid. And then the other part of Choline Plus, which helps aids in being more of a choline replacer, is a deep-fatted soy lettuce, which is a source of phosphatidylcholine and phospholipids. So, what this product does is it is a much lower dose compared to standard choline fluoride. We recommend about a one-quarter replacement rate in broilers, one-third to one-fifth in laying hens. Still trying to kind of dial that number down. But mainly mobilizing and metabolizing fat in a more efficient way.

Jordan
0:03:53
Also, ease of use. This thing can be put directly into a VTM. It's not going to degrade your vitamins. It's not going to degrade your minerals. So, freeze up the micro bin space. Don't have to worry about it, you can just put it

Jordan
0:04:04
in your pre-mix and get it in that way. It's a really, really cool product. Our partners over in India had done a lot of previous research on mode of action and making sure that the levels of those phytoactives are where we need them to be in every batch. So every batch is extremely consistent. They do grass chromatography and HPLC to ensure the levels of the phytoactives and the phospholipids. And yeah, it's been a really fun product to launch and excited to work with it. Have I ever told you my horror story about choline fluoride early in my career? No. Well, so formulating a premix, I needed to add choline fluoride, which we don't

Casey Bradley
0:04:45
like to, right? So this is more of a big premix, so we used it faster. Well, I did know that we I'm gonna do it fast. So you used a faster Well, I didn't know that we had a liquid form and a powder form of choline chloride And I put like a hundred pounds or more in and I get called into Mr. Convax office me like um

Casey Bradley
0:05:11
This would not have worked this is like a disaster and it's not safe for the employee Don't worry Jerry caught it. Yeah, I fixed it. Yeah, or it was a problem, but I'm like well nobody Yeah, it's that it was going for I'd 60% and yes what I use yeah Oh, man, that could have been really bad really bad. Yeah, I've done some really bad stuff That's how you learn and I learned I mean, you know looking back on it. He always used it as a teaching moment But never getting called into the boss's office because you messed up formulas

Casey Bradley
0:05:44
Never fun as a junior nutrition. 

Jordan
0:05:48
Oh, yeah. Yeah, I would be Shaking in my boots that were me 

Casey Bradley
0:05:57
And so you'll find if you guys see me out in public that I do sport the Brits poultry stocks I have to really highly recommend them, but I've heard only select people get them because there's not that many. There is a finite supply of the chicken stocks. I know, but yes, really great friends of our own, customers of ours. So we've done some different market research.

Casey Bradley
0:06:17
Yeah, we really appreciate that. Yeah, and obviously, great to work with Gary again, getting to know Jordan. I was like, laugh at Brian, and we're in the same area but yet we have to come to Atlanta to see him physically. We're doing a webcam, you know, type stuff. But I'm like, you could have just came to my office, man. Yeah.

Jordan
0:06:38
Yeah, it's always funny to, you have to travel a few thousand miles, a few hundred miles to see people that are in your backyard. Yeah, exactly.

Casey Bradley
0:06:48
Well, Jordan, thank you so much. Yeah, and I'm here. We look forward to having you again more on our podcast and on our Youtube channel

Jordan
0:06:48
Thank you guys

1
0:00:00
Well, we're back at IPPE 2025 with my Finnish friend, Tommi from Alimentrix.

2
0:00:12
Welcome to IPPE.

1
0:00:13
Thanks, Casey. Nice to be here.

2
0:00:15
Nice to be here. Can you tell us a little bit about Alimentrix and the story behind it?

1
0:00:20
Sure. So Alimentrix, we are now a 22-year-old company. We have been operating mainly in the gut health, like gastrointestinal microbiology area. The background lies on the animal nutrition, originally from DuPont, the founder of Alimetrix. Juha Apejalastu, who's the world's fat. But then he created his own business.

1
0:00:43
Okay, we need to have, there's no kind of a player, a lab who can do, focus in the gastrointestinal health and microbiology around it. So that's it. 22 years in operations. And I can't believe it's been 22 years. We're getting old. Yeah, you know, that's the thing. That's the thing. And yeah, of course, alimentary has been evolving over the times, expansion of having animal feeding trials, fatalities, whole chicken, wines, and now the diagnostics you did seven years ago.

1
0:01:16
So I first came in, I guess, known of Allometrix when I was at ABVista. So I started using those tests and analytics for our gut health product developments. And then since you've kind of grown and now we kind of collaborate together where we can on research, so in different product development. When you think about a lot of people here who are necessarily here for poultry and you think of, well, diagnostics, right?

1
0:01:51
What's the easiest diagnostic selection method? And that's usually feces. That's right.

2
0:01:59
And so, what are all the things we can get out of these fees? I mean, what are we looking for when we're taking those, we're using our products, like your bio freeze to preserve it? Like, that's just step one. What is, I mean, what can we all look at and evaluate

1
0:02:14
that tells us what's going on in the bird? That's a good question. Of course, if you are allowed only to take non-invasive metals, so I mean, meaning a piece collection, It restricts the kind of analysis pattern we can utilize in order to study the gut health. But for example, pathogens, that's the easy one.

1
0:02:37
We can analyze from fecal samples the pathogens like clostridium parviflagens, daimyria, endococcus

2
0:02:44
secarum, you name it.

1
0:02:46
I'm glad you're a lot better at saying those than I am.

6
0:02:49
I have been repeating.

5
0:02:50
Repeating, right?

1
0:02:51
Yeah, just a few times. Also like different various immunity markers, immune biomarkers. So that's also a possibility. The only challenge, it is that everybody is in a search for the ultimate best biomarker for poultry. No one has found it yet, neither have we, but we have a quite good selection of candidates we can utilise.

2
0:03:16
I was going to say, from being a biomarker girl, it's not just one,

1
0:03:21
it's machine learning and multiple biomarkers. Exactly, exactly. And of course, it depends on what kind of a product you are testing or our customers are testing, what is the mode of action of the product and so forth. So, you need to really consider multiple things and always I said,

1
0:03:39
whatever kind of gut health analysis you are performing, you should always also look at the blue technical data, the performance data, put it together, really deep dive, analyze different parameters.

2
0:03:52
So what are some of the main challenges your customers are coming to you with to help solve with your diagnosis?

1
0:03:57
I have started to see an increase in demand on like is my product doing something to the gut integrity, the immunity parameters. That goes back to the previous question, okay what is the best biomarker to study? They want to showcase that their product actually is affecting,

1
0:04:17
impacting already the subclinical symptoms on things like this, so that's the main thing. I don't know about different bacteria. Okay, how is the product impacting the microbial profile? Like, 16S sequencing has been used widely in this area, but maybe people start to be a little bit,

1
0:04:38
you know, like, fed up with the bacteria. Yeah, I have a...

2
0:04:42
Yeah, so what, right here, right?

4
0:04:43
So what? Right?

1
0:04:44
So, like, if we are looking previous years, the majority of the analysis we conducted last year for customers, chemical analysis, like short-chain fatty acids, easy to understand, concentration levels, 10 different immunity markers, the top ones, thirdly, bacteric. So some of the questions I get a lot with, you know, short-chain fatty acids you talked about, and obviously what's in the feces wasn't absorbed by the animal, but they do give us a good indication

1
0:05:16
of what's the hindgut's doing and what is going on in that BFA production and fermentation. Exactly, yeah. What are some short-chain fatty acids that you don't want to see? What are some of the indicators that something's not digesting properly? You mean in addition to the short-chain fatty acids.

2
0:05:37
Oh, something else, yeah.

1
0:05:38
Like, what would be a couple that you would say that you got something going on with your

3
0:05:42
gut health?

1
0:05:43
Yeah, exactly. So, biogenic amines, like thistamine, thistamidine, and this kind of cataverine, and this kind of substances, it links to the protein utilization and then conversion of the protein to amino acids and so forth. When the microbiota attacks, utilizes the excess protein, so it produces also different substances. So biogenic amines are the one, but also protein, but diffraction products, different phenolic toxic substances,

1
0:06:12
which are impacting the performance and so forth. So just to name a couple of ones. What is on the horizon of diagnostics, do you think? What's the future? What are you optimistic about? I think because many of our customers are looking rapid on‑site diagnostics. They want to find a tool. They have a boiled chicken flock. They want to impact already during the lifetime of 42 days,

1
0:06:40
35 days, they want to amend the diet if they see a challenge. So, I think there's a room, you need to have more rapid diagnostics but also like you mentioned, machine learning, artificial intelligence. So having a strong database behind.

1
0:06:56
Take the sample, analyze quickly, check against the database, do actions. That's the thing.

2
0:07:03
Well, thank you. We appreciate you being at IPTE with us.

1
0:07:07
Thank you, Casey. Thank you, Casey. It was a pleasure.



Casey Bradley
0:29:04
So, Morgan, thanks for a quick update of Pork. I didn't want the swine industry to feel left out of our special trade show season episode. Obviously, I was live at IPPE and was able to record some good video interviews. I did go to Iowa Pork. I got to see you in the hallway. And that was it. But I, I even tried to go to Missouri Pork this week, but we spent the night in the hotel. I did meet with a Missouri professor at the hotel. So I did get some networking in, but because of the massive snowstorm we had, I thought it was best to drive home, which I was glad I did. But I heard Missouri

Casey Bradley
0:29:47
Pork about 50% of the attendance because of Snowmageddon or whatever they're calling it. Now they're giving names to these crazy storms. So what was some highlights for you? You've been to a couple as well this season. 

Morgan Hart
0:30:09
Yeah, we went to Iowa Pork and it was very cold. I want to, and I think east, western Iowa got some snow or something. There's always seems to be something going on. We had a dusting on the car before I went, but yes, it was cold. Yeah, there seems to always be something going on. And I think there was a snowstorm that came in towards the end of Iowa Pork,

Casey Bradley
0:30:29
but yeah, attendance was down this year compared to previous years. There was quite a bit of exhibitors, but as far as like just industry, you know, contract growers or decision makers for the larger commercial producers, I would say attendance was definitely down this year. You know, whether that was... They're not there. And then we'd say vendors, but you know, they had coffee booths normally where we had vendors, and they had a lot more open space, so I don't even think they had as many vendors as normal.

Casey Bradley
0:31:09
Yeah, I think like the last two rows of the exhibition hall where there normally is booths were just empty. So you know, I mean, we all know that the pork industry has been hit hard the last 12 to 18 months with markets and, you know, ingredient prices have gone down quite a bit over the last six months. But, you know, I'm sure there's people are taking a hit. got from a lot of people is we have way too many shows. And I don't care what species you're talking about.

Casey Bradley
0:31:38
I think that's just in general. Yeah.

Casey Bradley
0:31:39
But you know, I P P E attendance was down.

Casey Bradley
0:31:42
We still have the South American crowd, but with high path AI, we didn't have a lot of American producers there. Um, a lot of vendor interactions with vendors, which is fine for me. But if you're a vendor, they're trying to get new businesses.

Casey Bradley
0:31:56
It's not.

Casey Bradley
0:31:56
Which is fine for me, but if you're a vendor, they're trying to get new businesses. It's not. And then also there is something that we did with profile and nutrition. We actually did a quiz bowl and that went really well, really popular. And some of this feedback I'm getting is like, we need to do something different. And I think we used to see a lot of South Farm managers, contract growers come,

Casey Bradley
0:32:29
A, because they were members of the pork associations of the states, but they also used to get training. And I think we're putting on this stuff of we're not really training, right? We're lecturing to people. And my crazy idea would be, and then we could take Iowa pork as an example is take out all the booths in the middle, put the equipment around the outside, because a feed additive, I don't need a booth to sell. But if I'm selling like a crate,

Casey Bradley
0:33:00
it's nice to have that on display. Right? And I always thought of like, let's do some lessons, like, so we have some presentations on how to communicate to employees. We'll use all the vendors to do some mock interactions with the South Farm managers or growers or different. And that's just one example, right? On communication, but you can think of everything like skill building that these. These people need from contract growers to South Farm managers and different things,

Casey Bradley
0:33:32
and I think you get people to come back, but what value is it for them to come around and get free stuff anymore? And then it's the same people speaking at multiple shows or they're online. You can listen to podcasts. There's so many outlets for information today where that show used to be, besides a printed magazine, used to be your information you got from a sow farm. So I really do think we need to do things differently.

Casey Bradley
0:34:03
And I can tell you my suggestion of testing out the quiz bowl and doing live interviews from a podcast perspective. I.P.P.E. We need to start thinking outside of the box to engage with our industry again and bringing value to them than just having a booth. I sell this saying hello and I get a free plan.

Morgan Hart
0:34:26
Yeah.

Morgan Hart
0:34:27
Yeah, I think, I mean, the smaller regional shows that we had, you know, we were at Minnesota and South Dakota. And those smaller shows, we had a lot of customers and the turnout for both of those shows were very, very good this year. So I mean, granted, there was a little bit of weather, but I don't know if it's just a different way that the industry is, you know, all the contract, I don't say all the contract growers, but I would say I was

Morgan Hart
0:35:01
majority contract growers now where, you know, Minnesota, South Dakota, there's a lot of, still a lot of smaller, you know, 4,000 or less independent producers. So I'm not sure if that is the driver for the number of people. But yeah, it's interesting to see how the dynamics have shifted over the last five years.

Casey Bradley
0:35:27
Yeah, and I touched basis with Andy White a little bit up in Michigan. I texted him to see how it went and said, sorry, I couldn't make it up. And he had weather-related issues, too.

Casey Bradley
0:35:40
They didn't have no shows for the afternoons because the weather was bad and people couldn't get in there. And he said he had a speaker from Google come in and kind of talk about branding, and he said it didn't really probably hit the mark for most of the people that were there. Even though it wasn't a bad presentation, it just probably wasn't on mark of what producers needed to hear. And I just think about even content of... I like to go because obviously you like to see people, but you know...

Casey Bradley
0:36:13
The fact that I didn't have any of my pork producer people to go see, and that was disappointing. Because it is nice to just catch up, like what's going on and I guess I don't know if we're too busy or budgets or what but we can't even I don't know I don't feel it's as much family as it has been because it used to like world pork is like a family reunion but even I think on the producer side too, there's, we all know that there's a labor shortage within the ag industry.

Morgan Hart
0:36:57
And so I think it's probably a lot harder for owners or even managers to leave the farm for, you know, even 24 hours if they don't have the help. 

Casey Bradley
0:37:18
Any suggestions on making it better changes? Is it going to die out and just have a annual meeting for the pork producers councils in each state? What's your thoughts?

Morgan Hart
0:37:24
I don't know. We, well Wisconsin specifically, I don't know the last time Wisconsin has had its own pork conference, but we have teamed up with the Soy Expo. So, I mean, I walked through the trade show and it was mostly corn and soy producers

Morgan Hart
0:37:43
or companies, seed companies, but we did have our like annual meeting at the show. And then they do tailor some speakers for pork-specific producers. And so, I think, you know, either combining, you know, whether that's combining a poultry show and a pork show, as most of the topics are translational between species, being able to do that, I think will probably help a little bit. But I don't know, just providing more value, kind of like how you mentioned, like what can we do to provide value at these trade shows

Morgan Hart
0:38:29
than just walking through and seeing what's there type thing. 

Casey Bradley
0:38:39
Yeah, and I think the other thing walking through my disappointment, and I know it's probably market conditions, but I did talk to Rob Musser at Elanco and it sounds like their pipeline's full. They came out with a new product and they said, you know, they have their pipeline full to bring

Casey Bradley
0:38:49
out a new product for the next five years, which is exciting, right? But I didn't, I don't really see any innovation or new product development or it's like me too. And that also concerns me because that's usually Iowa Pork is the launch, the winter launch of new products in the swine industry and in the summer it's world pork. And I think

Casey Bradley
0:39:18
the Elanco's product's the only one I heard about at Iowa Pork this year.

Morgan Hart
0:39:23
Yeah it's and I mean there has been a lot of

Morgan Hart
0:39:25
uh company turnover. There's been you know there's been a lot of transitions, like we talked about before, within the industry, you know, at the, from the top to the bottom, large corporate companies all the way down to the individual producers. So there's a lot of things going on here. And I think, I don't know, I know that the election and everything that's happened in in DC over the last four weeks has gotten a lot, a lot of different people stirred up,

Morgan Hart
0:40:11
I should say, so nicely. So we'll see. I mean, I don't know, there's been a lot of stuff going on in the last six weeks. So I don't know what's going to happen by July.

Casey Bradley
0:40:16
I can tell you the best thing about trying to go to Missouri Pork was that the Holiday Inn had bacon and I ate three pieces of the most well done, not well done, like

Casey Bradley
0:40:36
perfectly, not crispy.

Casey Bradley
0:40:37
I don't like crispy bacon. Like Casey loved bacon prepared. And I still think there's a place for bacon in this world. So I am optimistic about the swine industry. Oh yeah. There always will be a place for bacon and sausage. Exactly. So, well, there's several episodes coming up.

Casey Bradley
0:41:01
We're back. Morgan and Casey. Nora's going to be popping in here or there, but we're really excited. We just wanted to touch bases on trade shows. And if I was better prepared,

Casey Bradley
0:41:11
I could have done some live interviews as well, but I could have done some live interviews as well, but

Casey Bradley
0:41:17
Until next time everybody enjoy a cup of coffee and stay caffeinated