Cows and beef products are always targeted as bad for the environment and human consumption, but both are easier to promote and justify for in recent years.
Usually when someone attacks the beef industry, one doesn’t have to look far to realize there are some animal rights activist cow haters involved.
It’s a lot like politics – truth and science be damned, say anything you want and hopefully it sticks on the wall.
The part those against the beef industry dislike to hear is consumers’ high demand for good beef products and the dollars they are willing to spend on them.
A good barometer is to look at what is happening with the Certified Angus Beef (CAB) brand, made up of Angus producers.
John Stikain, CAB meat business president, says, “Since 1978, CAB’s success has been in large part because of the engaging, forward-thinking and collaborative producers and partners we work with from pasture to plate.”
A recent BEEF Magazine article reads, “In a year marked by shifting marketing dynamics and margin pressure across the supply chain, CAB closed its Fiscal Year 2024 (FY24) with its second strongest sales year in the company’s history. With growth both domestically and internationally, the global beef brand sold 1.237 billion pounds across the U.S. and 55 countries.”
It is one of the reasons we see more and more restaurants across the country advertise “Angus Beef” on their menus. It sells.
The most popular slogan in the meat business has been, “Beef. It’s What’s For Dinner.” But I believe “Angus Beef” would have to be a close second. We see it from top-end restaurants to fast-food hamburgers to local retailers.
Good genetics and management have earned CAB producers nearly $100 per head above market price in grid premiums for cattle meeting the CAB brand standards.
Consumers can also find CAB-branded beef in their local grocery stores. Retail stores had 521.5 million pounds of CAB beef sold in their stores during FY24. This marked six years of more than 500 million pounds sold with retailers.
The international CAB product sales are said to have grown by 4.6 percent in FY24 to 194.8 million pounds. While overall U.S. exports were down, this huge growth was in large part due to increased sales in Mexico which grew by 30 percent, making it the brand’s second-largest international market.
CAB’s Prime beef sales reached a new level with 50.5 million pounds sold, growing 22.5 percent from 2023. This goes to show consumers are not backing away from beef.
With the figures you have read above, CAB producers must have a lot of pride in their products of beef. The public has bought into the brand, both nationally and internationally. Here, back in the hills, we call it marketing.
Dennis Sun is the publisher of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup, a weekly agriculture newspaper available online and in print.
