Dicllairing War on Dean Foods...

Declaring War on Dean Foods...…Sorry Berkeley Farms.

A story on VPR the other day was the last straw for me ( http://www.vpr.net/news_detail/85513/). For those of you who do not live in Vermont and listen to NPR you may not get your regular “maple and milk” news, we are having an agricultural crisis. Dairy Farming and Maple Sugaring are the backbone of our communities, economics and traditions here in Vermont. It is much more then Cabet Cheese and “real” Vermont Maple Syrup here, but around here every one knows a farmer and/or a sugarer personally. While global warming makes the sugaring season shorten and slowly drift into Canada, this summer all the news has been about milk and farming. In 1985 there were 3000 farms in Vermont (not all Dairy). Now there are just 1000, and with IBM loosing hundreds of jobs every year not all farmers have become computer scientists.

Dairy farmers work longer hours then you and work seven days a week without vacations, often. They do it because of as Tevye says “tradition.” Well it is not for the money. Today Dairy farmers in VT get $11.00 per 100 ibl’s of milk. It cost them $17.00. Recently a government proposal was suggested that would bridge that gap by a dollar or two…that is not a bridge. This business middle is not stainable, so there has been an effort to get Dairy Processors to share their larger cut of the pie more with the farmers. The Vermont Milk Commission set up a meeting and all the local processors attended to help. But the largest processor, Dean Foods, was not present, or was represented by an organization that they are a member of not an actual representative from the company, unlike the other processors. Dean does not see the point, when government regulates milk prices and rates for farmers. And government already subsidizes framers. First off the congress last made the rate change 5 years ago…things have changed since then. Second it is bad business to leave your suppliers without a livable business structure…So why is it so important that Dean’s come to the table…they have a monopoly (which is now likely to be investigated thanks to the efforts of VT Sen. Burney Sanders (I) ), Dean controls 70% of the market.

Don't Buy Dean Foods

So my first thought was we need to spread the word to other communities and tell them not to but Dean Foods brand milk products. So I went to their website and found a map of their brands (http://deanfoods.com/brands.aspx )…and I look and there is little, always good to me, Berkeley Farms, a subsidiary. I miss Berkeley farms slogan “Cows in Berkeley? MOOOOOO!” My first conscious realization of cool graphic design was a business card cut out like the shape of an iconic BF milk carton, I got from our milk delivery guy from Berkley Farms when I worked at the Mill Valley Coffee Roastery. I have missed Berkeley since the day I left at the age of 12, and now I must demand you stop buying their milk…PLEASE DON’T BUY IT. If you look at the map they are prevalent. In VT we need to stay away from Garelick…which is easy to do…but Check the map carefully…we all have Land of the Lake cheese for example.

So the answer is yes there are Cows in Berkeley…but they are owned by the man.

Thanks.

Ben