E397 Why 150 Well-Managed Cows Beat 500 Poorly-Run Ones - By $100,000

The "get big or get out" mantra has dominated dairy industry thinking for decades. But what if everything you've been told about scale is wrong? Cornell's 2023 Dairy Farm Business Summary just dropped a bombshell: well-managed 150-cow operations are consistently outearning poorly-managed 500-cow dairies by over $100,000 annually. This isn't motivational fluff—it's hard data that challenges the fundamental assumptions driving consolidation. In this paradigm-shifting episode, we dissect the numbers that prove management quality trumps scale every time, and reveal the exact three-phase strategy successful small dairies are using to dominate their markets.

Key Takeaways:

• The $4.32/cwt operating cost gap between top and bottom performers that has nothing to do with herd size
• Why achieving 50+ cows per worker b ...