Burnett Enterprises, out of Carpenter, WY, is one of Wyoming’s eight to ten dairy farms. It is still thriving, despite economic uncertainties.
According to the NASDAQ stocks, the price of milk has dropped roughly nine points from November 2019. A small number, compared to the DOW Jones Industrial and S&P Stocks. But the number is still significant for farmers and ranchers.
“You’ve got to remember the American farmer is a resilient, tough son of a gun,” said Jeff Burnett, owner of the dairy company. “They’re always out there to produce high quality, nutritious food, and they’re an optimist. Our family is included in that.”
According to Burnett, around 50% of dairy produce goes to schools and food services, but those activities are restricted due to the COVID 19 pandemic. Some dairy farms in Wisconsin have had to dump thousands of gallons of milk, due to the decreased need. Nationally, it’s roughly 55,000 pounds of milk per day, equally to about 10% of milk produced daily.
Burnett Enterprises has not had to dump any of it’s milk produce.
They have also expanded their business, building a new milking parlor in November 2019. The parlor can milk an additional 800 cows.
“It’s a huge mental weight when you work so hard to produce such a high quality product, and your intentions are there to feed hungry people, feed America, and feed the world,” said Burnett. “That’s the American farmer’s dream, and here we are. All of our hard work’s going down the drain.”
The family owned and operated dairy farm started in 2004, and they are milking about 4,500 cows, with 50 employees.
“On one shift, we have five employees and three robots. That’s all it takes. We milk three times a day, and we’re producing about four to five semi loads of milk every day,” said Reese Burnett.
Reese, Jeff’s son, is a sophomore at Kansas State. With virtual schooling, he is receiving more education from the first hand experience of working for the family dairy company. their business is a 27/7 operation that runs 365 days out of the year, and their main concern is keeping the cows happy.
“What we need to make sure that consumers understand, is that if our cows aren’t comfortable, they’re not going to be producing milk like they should be to their genetic potential,” said Reese. “It’s our job to make sure they they’re always comfortable and always have full feed and clean beds to lay down in, and are happy cows”
Burnett enterprises is FDA inspected, and according to Burnett, the milk goes through four to five quality assurance tests before being consumed by the public.
To mitigate the potential spread of COVID-19 in their parlors, the company has closed their office doors and employee break room, and have cleaned common areas more thoroughly.
Source: wyomingnewsnow.tv
