PANDA PUNCHING ABOVE ITS WEIGHT

“The bank still thinks I’m crazy, but I have proven the business model. I love the marketing side of it. You can add value by how you market cows. You can also lose money marketing them incorrectly.” - Molly Westwood

Anyone who thinks it’s too hard to start a business in the registered cattle game should spend some time with Molly Westwood.

The 34-year-old UK owner of the now globally recognised Panda Holsteins wasn’t raised on a registered farm and – when she left school aged 16 – she had no farm, no big-time cows under her belt, and she was painfully shy. To the point that she wouldn’t answer the home phone, and if a sales representative came to their commercial family dairy, she would find somewhere else to be. She was happy working with cows, but she gave a “hard pass” when it came to engaging with people.

One of five siblings, including her identical twin sister, Jess, the tightknit family was headed up by their parents, Andrew and Sharon. Molly was always acutely aware of how hard her parents worked – right down to Sharon teaching on the weekends to put food on the table. It inspired her to also work hard.

It’s no accident that on July 1, Panda Holsteins will market a select group of 70 lots [60 live lots] that will be chased hard by breeders at Panda’s Devon farm in southwest England – overlooking Exmoor and the Darmoor National Parks. It is the culmination of a decade of farming a small, registered herd that the bank didn’t believe in – and the industry didn’t understand…at first.

However, Molly does nothing without a plan and most likely a spreadsheet. Such is her enduring passion for world class cows, she overcame her incredible shyness and found her voice through her business with her beloved Holsteins – and more specifically her biggest passion – Red & White Holsteins.

This is a story of what “hard graft” can achieve…

When Tahora Farms floated the idea of a cattle sale, there was always the expectation that it might come with a twist.

The challenge of having as much passion for breeding cows as breeding and training polo ponies meant the two are always jostling for pole position at Tahora.

It’s also a risky move to mix things up too much, but Tahora never backs away from a challenge.

 It’s hard to believe that the dairy industry’s influential global marketing power players aren’t begging Candace Borland to help it sell itself.

Afterall, the baseline of this Canadian’s skills were learned in the registered dairy industry and applied to corporate Canada – directly from her family’s famous and aggressively marketed Rapid Bay Jerseys at Ormstown, Quebec. Today, Rapid Bay – owned by Candace’s father, Stephen.

She is today the partner and Chief Executive Officer of Anomaly Toronto, a deliberately undefined full-service marketing and communications business with a roster of world-class clients that today include brands (to name a few) Anheuser-Busch Inbev, lululemon, Pepsi Co, Ferrero Rocher global, and Capital One.

And, she has some thoughts regarding how the dairy industry could market itself…