Dairy Checkoff trying to boost demand short and long term
Washington Ag Today October 5, 2009 It is tough economic times in the dairy industry right now. So a frequent question at the Dairy Management Inc booth at last week’s Dairy Expo in Madison, Wisconsin was what are you doing for me right now? One of the people answering that question was Liz Anderson, a Washington dairy producer and board member of DMI, which manages the dairy check off. During a phone interview from Dairy Expo, Anderson emphasized the importance of partnerships for the promotional work the dairy check off does, and how that’s paying off right now. Anderson: “We put more money towards these partnerships asking, can you help us? And they stepped up right away. Like McDonald‘s, their Angus Burger they released that and it has two slices of cheese on it versus one that their regular hamburger has on it. And McDonald‘s over 44% of their burger sales are cheese burgers and they are pushing cheese like crazy on that. And also Domino‘s. Their new Legend pizzas they were advertising, there is 40% more cheese on them. And they are also working saying come in and ask for more cheese and we will give it for the same price. They are trying to help us as much as they can by giving us new menu items. We helped develop the menu items and they release them a little early. They are trying to help us as much as they can. Those are the efforts we need and sales are going up.” To develop long term dairy consumers, Anderson pointed to the work DMI is doing with schools and its partnership with the NFL. I’m Bob Hoff and that’ Washington Ag Today on the Northwest Ag Information Network.
