by Marketwire
October 4, 2010

THORP, WI–(Marketwire – October 4, 2010) –  On September 16^th Grass Point Farms was notified that it placed first for ultra-pasteurized 2% white milk at the World Dairy Expo Championship Dairy Product Contest and third overall with a score of 99.85 out of 100. Sixteen milk brands competed in the event. Judges commented that Grass Point’s milk had “a creamy rich flavor.”

“We are seeing a greater understanding from consumers on the different methods of food production. This is increasing our demand and distribution reach across the country,” says Chad Pawlak, president, Grass Point Farms, the country’s only full line of production grass fed dairy products. 

Grass fed dairy products come from cows that live the lifestyle they were meant to live, roaming outdoors, grazing on pastures and eating harvested grasses in the winter months. ”Consumers are tired of hearing and supporting factory farms. The treatment of cows is becoming more important and Grass Point is here to highlight the benefits of rotational grazing,” say Pawlak. 

The milk from grass fed cows offers consumers rich tasting dairy products with the greatest health benefits that go beyond organic and conventional dairy, including being free of artificial growth hormones, higher in naturally occurring beta carotene (Vitamin A), conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), and Omega-3 fatty acids. According to the American Grassfed Association initial research has shown grass fed dairy products are crucial in reducing cholesterol, diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure and other life threatening diseases.

“Much of the world is already steps ahead of the US in their grass fed dairy cultivation,” says Pawlak. “It’s important to go back to basics and focus on the animals that are providing us with our dairy. The way our Grass Point Farms’ North American farmers are functioning is the way it used to be, cows raised in a healthy and stress-free environment is what gives our dairy products their value.”

ABOUT GRASS POINT FARMS:

Grass Point Farms offers a full line of milk, butter and an assortment of cheeses. Grass Point Farms cheeses are available in retail and deli packaging. The milk for Grass Point Farms’ dairy products comes solely from family farms where the cows roam open pastures grazing on their natural diet of grasses. All Grass Point Farms products proudly carry the Certified Pasture stamp of approval. 

Chad Pawlak of Grass Point Farms grateful to Oprah for giving Pollan air time

by Sustainable Food News
January 28, 2010

Michael Pollan, best-selling author and a leader of the sustainable food movement, was a guest on The Oprah Winfrey Show Wednesday in a segment titled “Food 101.”

“Fat, carbohydrates and calories are listed on every label, but where that food comes from, what’s been added and what’s been removed isn’t as easy to see,” read the show’s promo. “Michael Pollan on the truth about the food you eat.”

Pollan laid out his simple approach to eating: “I’ve boiled it down to seven words: Eat food. Mostly plants. Not too much.”

Pollan said when he does eat meat, he prefers grass-fed beef.

“I’m very picky about the meat I eat,” Pollan said. “I eat grass-fed beef, which is now becoming more common. Yes, it’s still more expensive, but it’s a very sustainable product.”

When he’s buying dairy, he said he looks for pastured dairy – milk from grass-fed cows.

“It’s got more beta carotene, more omega-3s, all this kind of stuff,” said Pollan.

That kind of exposure on the highest-rated talk show in television history – seen by over 25 million viewers a week – is sure to further boost the sustainable food movement into the mainstream.

Sustainable Food News asked Chad Pawlak, president of Grass Point Farms & Wisconsin Organics, brands of OFM, LLC, a major producer of grass-fed milk products, what he thought of Pollan’s thoughts.

“We expect that Pollan’s plug for grass-fed milk and beef will allow for additional questions to be asked by consumers and retailers,” he said. “These questions we expect to lead to greater understanding of the sustainability and health attributes of both grass-fed dairy and beef.”

“Once this occurs sales growth will follow at Grass Point Farms as we have the only written and third-party audited grass-fed dairy standards in the United States and have access to the grass-fed milk supply to service retail accounts across the entire country.”

“All of us at Grass Point are thankful Oprah took the time to give Michael Pollan a platform to share the important message of sustainable food production to her audience,” said Pawlak.

To see the Oprah video promo, click here.

Pollan published his sixth book last month, titled “Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual.”

Pollan is also the author of best-sellers “The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals,” published in 2006, and most recently, “In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto,” published in January 2008.

2008 goals for Grass Point Farms, Wisconsin Organics underway

by Sustainable Food News
November 12, 2007

Chad Pawlak remembers as a kid bounding up the steps of the Blue Moon Cheese Factory in Thorp, Wis., to visit his dad, who, like his father before, made a living at the plant handling wheels of cheese.

It was backbreaking work, and Chad’s father impressed on him at early age the difference between earning a paycheck using brawn versus brains.

Chad chose the latter. Today, he is president of Organic Farm Marketing, Inc. (OFM), manufacturer of Grass Point Farms line of grass based products and Wisconsin Organics certified organic dairy products.

Coming full circle, Pawlak announced OFM’s new corporate headquarters are now located in the former Blue Moon Cheese Factory, where his father and grandfather worked for 40 years. The new digs will quadruple the company’s office space and enable onsite manufacturing and distribution operations.

Grass Point Farms offers a full line of milk products, butter, and an assortment of cheeses ranging from Monterey jack to mozzarella to cheddar to blue and other specialty cheeses.

Wisconsin Organics also sells a wide variety of milk, cheese and butter products that come from local organic dairy farms.

About 95 percent of the company’s product is sold in the retail channel. The company seeks to increase market share for its Wisconsin Organics brand and expects its Grass Point brand to gain national distribution by the end of next year.

Currently, Pawlak said the company has “peppered” distribution meaning products sold at various points across the country but primary distribution remains in the Upper Midwest.

The company’s goal is to increase its presence in the foodservice market.

“With many foorand dservice companies looking for pasture-raised dairy products, we feel a great growth opportunity is available here,” Pawlak said.

To deliver on those expectations, the company named Danny Welcome as its new national sales manager to help build upon a national broker network that currently consists of nine brokers in the central U.S.

Wellcome has over 30 years of sales and management experience in the fresh food industry, specifically in the meat, deli, seafood and bakery industries, OFM said.

April 25, 2007
By Ron Johnson, Dairy Editor

Science is something some consumers refuse to trust, especially when it comes to milk.

Rusty Bishop, director of the Wisconsin Center for Dairy Research, injected the scientific viewpoint into a discussion titled “Niche Markets – Myths and Reality” during last week’s Wisconsin Cheese Industry Conference at La Crosse.

Bishop spoke after a representative of Whole Foods, a large, retail marketer of organic foods, and before a representative of Organic Valley, a Wisconsin-based co-op that specializes in organic milk and other organic foods. He tackled six of what he termed “organic claims” and followed them with “scientific facts.”

No more nutrients

The first claim is that “Organic milk contains more ‘nutrients.’”

Not so, according to Bishop. “Increased ‘nutrients’ are due to high-quality pasture, regardless of whether it’s organic or conventional, including CLA (conjugated linoleic acid), omega-3 fatty acids, flavenoids, and other antioxidants.”

Same pesticides

Claim No. 2: “Organic milk has less exposure to pesticide residue.”

Wrong again, said the dairy research center director.

“Pesticide residue is minimized on organic pasture and grain crops,” Bishop acknowledged. “But USDA data confirms very low, but equal, levels of residue in organic and conventional raw milk.”

Same antioxidants

The third claim is that “Organic milk has higher levels of antioxidants.”

“Higher levels of antioxidants are only related to significant feed intake from pasture-grazed cows – organic and conventional,” Bishop said.

More mycotoxins

“Organic milk has lower levels of mycotoxins” is the third claim. Not only is this claim false, but just the opposite is true, according to Bishop.

“Actually, scientific studies in the U.S. and Europe show higher mycotoxin levels in organic milk, due to ineffective organic pesticide treatment of grain crops,” he said.

Microbial resistance

Claim No. 5 is that “Organic milk leads to less antimicrobial resistance.” This claim is also false, Bishop said.

He explained, “Research in the U.S. and Switzerland conclusively proved no difference in antibiotic resistance of bacteria isolated from organic and conventionally treated cows.”

Organic milk safe

The sixth claim is that “Organic milk is safe.”

This claim, agreed Bishop, is indeed true. But he asserted, “All milk is safe.”

Many don’t believe

But many people either do not know the science-based truth or they simply do not believe it. Bishop noted four aspects of the “consumer environment.”

First, he said, there’s a “growing mistrust of science and technology.” Second is the increasing “rejection of advanced technology.”

This rejection and mistrust are accompanied by people favoring what they think of as “more-natural alternatives.” What’s more, all these points are “most apparent in the realm of food and nutrition,” Bishop observed.

This quest for “more-natural” alternatives has led to opportunities in fluid milk, cheese and other dairy products. Bishop noted six general niche markets that have been developed.

First is the niche market for what Bishop called “reduced” dairy products. For cheese, this category includes reduced-fat, reduced sodium and reduced colorings.

The next niche category is “fortified” cheeses. These can have had several things added to them – probiotics, CLA, omega-3 fatty acids, antioxidants and prebiotics.

Then there are “natural” cheeses. Bishop admitted that he has a tough time defining “natural” cheese, other than as one that is not a processed cheese.

Another niche market is for cheeses made from raw milk. These cheeses are either made without the milk being heated at all, or with it being heated in a way that is not pasteurization.

Of course, cheese made from organically produced milk is another niche market. So is cheese made from the milk of cows that have been grazed.

Besides refuting some of the claims made about organic dairy products, Bishop also took on the claims about raw milk. There are several.

Raw milk, said Bishop, is claimed to contain nutrients and enzymes necessary for calcium absorption. Drinking raw milk supposedly prevents certain allergies, along with arthritis. It’s touted as being more digestible, along with having its whey proteins intact.

What’s more, raw milk proponents say it contains more CLA, calcium and other minerals, and that it is more nutritious than pasteurized milk. They also say drinking raw milk lessens the incidence of tooth decay, boosts disease resistance and increases fertility.

The “scientific facts,” according to Bishop state otherwise.

“The enzymes destroyed by pasteurization are bovine enzymes, which are not used by the human body to metabolize calcium or other nutrients,” he stated. And, there’s “no scientific basis for allergy and arthritis claims.”

Nor are whey proteins destroyed by pasteurization, Bishop continued. What’s more, both raw milk and pasteurized milk contain CLA, calcium and other minerals.

“There is no objective, scientific evidence that milk pasteurization has any adverse effect on human nutrition or health,” Bishop added. “The alluded health benefits of raw milk are either anecdotal or unsupported by scientific fact, while it has been repeatedly demonstrated that the consumption of raw-milk products represents a substantial risk of infectious diseases.”

What about the supposed better, or different flavors in raw-milk cheeses? “Most desired cheese flavors derived from raw-milk microflora can be obtained by using appropriate starter adjuncts,” Bishop said.

Pasture milk

While organic milk and raw milk are no better than so-called “conventional” milk, there is one category that does, indeed, have added benefits. That’s the milk from grazed cows.

The dairy research center director said cheese made from the milk of pastured cows contains more CLA, more omega-3 fatty acids and more antioxidants. But, he emphasized, “Grazing is the key – not organic versus conventional.”

Bishop went on to compare other aspects of the milk from grazed cows, organic milk and that produced conventionally.

First he looked at the rolling herd averages of all three categories. Conventional herds produce, by far, the most milk, with a rolling herd average of 24,676 pounds, said Bishop. That compares to 16,823 pounds for organically managed herds, and 16,755 for grazed herds.

Cows in organic and grazed herds do better when it comes to fat and protein. Grazed herds average 4.3 percent fat and 3.22 percent protein, while organically managed herds average 3.87 percent fat and 3.1 percent protein. For conventionally managed herds the numbers are 3.83 percent fat and 3.06 percent protein.

But organic and grazed herds tend to have higher somatic cell counts (SCCs), a measure of milk quality. For grazed herds the average SCC is 262,000, and for organic herds it’s 276,000. Conventionally managed herds, by contrast, had a 236,000 SCC average.

Bottom line

The “bottom line,” according to Bishop, is that, yes, there are some “beneficial” differences among certain categories of niche dairy products. He listed the “reduced” dairy products in this category, along with those that are fortified and those made from milk from grazed cows.

On the other hand, there are three categories that do not have beneficial differences. These, said Bishop, exist because consumers make “marketing choices.” In this category are cheeses and other dairy products touted as “natural,” those made from raw milk, and those made from organic milk.

Natural causes

Bishop took a jab at the “organic” market when he showed a slide of a cartoon. In it, a shelf labeled “organic foods” had fallen on a shopper. Two police officers were at the scene. One said to the other, “I’m putting down that he died of natural causes

This cheese comes from cows that are fed grasses not treated with pesticides, herbicides or other chemicals. Why should you be interested in cheese that comes from grass-fed cows? Here’s why … cheese from grass-fed cows contain a healthy balance of omega-3 and omega-6 fats whereas cheese from grain-fed cows can be very high in the omega-6 fats that most people get far too much of – too much omega-6 leads to a variety of diseases – and quite low in the omega-3 fats that most people don’t get enough of. Another good reason … cheese from grass-fed cows is high in “conjugated linoleic acid.” In fact, it contains five times more CLA than dairy from grain-fed cows! CLA, which are most abundant in grass-fed products, are among the most potent cancer fighters in all foods. And another great reason to buy cheese from grass-fed cows is that it tastes better! And even better it also carries a certified humane label. Also available in Mild Cheddar, Sharp Cheddar, Colby, Mozzarella, Reduced Fat Farmers, Monterey Jack, Blue, Feta and Parmesan. Retails for $3.59 to $3.89/8-oz.

Pastured Raised Raw Cheddar Places Second in Debut Year

THORP, WI (September, 2006) – Parent company Organic Farm Marketing, Inc., is proud to announce that Grass Point Farms, manufacturer of the first nationally distributed, certified humane line of pasture raised dairy products, placed second in the cheddar division of the World Dairy Expo Championship Dairy Product Contest. The World Dairy Expo, with its comprehensive format, is the only national judging contest of its kind in the United States. The raw milk cheddar, the newest offering from Grass Point Farms, was judged against numerous entries by dairy experts including: Marianne Smukowski, Wisconsin Center of Dairy Research, and Dr. Robert Bradley, University of Wisconsin Madison, Food Science Department. The winners were told that this contest guarantees their customers are consuming “The best of the best” in dairy when purchasing their products.

“We are just thrilled that our raw milk cheddar placed,” says Chad Pawlak, president, Grass Point Farms. “To enter a debuting product and take second in a contest like the Dairy Expo is an amazing achievement and really demonstrates the natural goodness of pasture based dairy products.” Unlike most dairy products, the milk for Grass Point Farms comes solely from family farms where the cows graze on the lush pastures of Wisconsin’s rolling hills. This ancient approach to dairy farming allows cows to spend their days roaming the pastures and grazing on their natural diet of grasses. It’s this diet that produces the purest, most wholesome milk possible.

In addition to its award winning taste, consumers of Grass Point Farms’ dairy products can be assured that they are consuming a product that is 100 percent cow friendly and environmentally sound. “People want dairy that tastes good,” says Chad Pawlak , “but they also want the assurance that what they’re eating was produced in a humane fashion.” Grass Point Farm’s farmers are “managed rotational grazers” (MRG). So-called because it revolves around grazing animals on fresh grasses, rotating the herd to various sections of pasture (referred to as a paddock) in order to ensure the herd dines on the fresh grasses and legumes available to the herd. MRG is considered the most humane and environmentally responsible method of raising farm animals.

Grass Point Farms offers a full line of milk available in all sizes and varieties, and an assortment of cheeses ranging from Monterey Jack to mozzarella to cheddar to blue, and other unique, specialty cheeses. Grass Point Farms cheeses are available in both retail as well as deli packaging. Their butter comes in quarters in a one pound package. All Grass Point Farms products proudly carry the Certified Humane stamp of approval.

Demand for organic goods creates room for some alternatives

By Ann Meyer
Special to the Tribune
Published July 17, 2006

The absence of an organic label probably won’t deter consumers who understand that grass-fed generally translates to a more natural offering than conventional products, said Robert Scaman, president of a Chicago distributor of organic food.

The promise of new supply at a lower price point will appeal to consumers and retailers alike, he said. “They’re all hungering for more items and more quantity,” he said. While organics were considered on the fringe when Scaman started in the business 16 years ago, they’ve become mainstream as more people understand the health benefits. “It’s a grass-roots movement based on consumers’ desire for safe, nutritious food,” he said. “Now we’re waiting for the supply side to catch up with demand.”

full story to be posted soon…

Ray Mueller
MEDFORD
Among cropping practices, managed grazing ranks at or near the top for controlling soil erosion, reducing fertilizer runoff, enhancing wildlife habitat, balancing manure and nutrient applications with crop use, cutting the use of pesticides, and keeping carbon in the soil rather than allowing it to escape into the atmosphere, the Natural Resource Conservative Service’s grazing lands specialist for Wisconsin Brian Pillsbury reminded his audience at a workshop and field day for Grass Point Farms.

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Ray Mueller
MEDFORD
For the Joe Tomandl II and III families and their colleagues in Grass Point Farms (a new dairy marketing organization), not everything is attractive in the agricultural changes that are large scale, emphasize high production and depend on intensive management.

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