Climb Cringe Mountain: This Couple Is Building a Cattle Operation From Nothing

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And it was a fun, creative and just something for me to create and get my mind off what was going on in the real world. So it took off. People like it for whatever reason. It's crazy to me. It's nearly 300,000 people. Yeah, it's it's it's it's we've we've seen some growth in the past year and Yeah, it's a lot to navigate. It's a unique industry. It's a unique world.

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Are you focused on anything specifically or just kind of anything goes? I think my main focus on it is just that my real life comes first. Like I try really hard not to put too much pressure on it. Like it's supposed to be fun.

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There's times, you know, I get stressed out about it and, you know, worried about X, Y, and Z. And I have to, at the end of the day, remember like I can delete this and be gone and go live a perfectly fulfilling life without social media. There is a podcast in Iowa, funk for profit was named by they. They stirred up a banker near, then quick came an auctioneer.

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Making profit was their first goal, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Soon may the farmers come to bring us guests and beer and fun. One day when the recording's done, we'll take our money. Well, hey, ladies and gentlemen, if you can hear our voice near the right, implement John Deere booth. We are going to do another interview with the Farm for Profit podcast.

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If you can hear our voice, come over, take a seat, take a listen. Front row's still open. That's because everyone's over getting hats signed by Tractor Guy. Actually, he ran out of hats. We love doing these shows live at trade shows, but we also curate them to go out on our podcast platform for those that don't have the pleasure of being here. So we get to address our podcast listeners.

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Yeah. Yeah. Well, we love starting off all of our interviews with going back to when you were a kid. So let's start with you first, Lauren. Did you grow up on a farm? No, so the elevator pitch of how I got involved in ag in general, it'll be a long elevator ride, but I'll try to make it quick. It'll be a long one.

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I went to a birthday party with pony rides, and I was like, oh my gosh, I love this. This is amazing. Santa brought me riding lessons for, it was the Christmas, I'm a New Year's Day baby, so I was turning five the next week. Okay. And yeah, Santa brought me riding lessons and borderline, that's all she wrote. So I grew up riding horses and it was fun. My parents knew nothing about it.

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And so it was a whirlwind for them to learn how to. I was like, hey, we got to go get a horse. You know, I leased, I borrowed, I did the whole thing. And then once you have a horse, you now need a trailer for the horse and a truck to pull the trailer out of the horse and horses need shoes. And it was a whole learning curve for my parents. So like riding, showing, racing, what do you do?

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I was involved in like a 4-H type program called Pony Club. It's very niche. I grew up writing English, so hunter-jumpers, and I wasn't big on competing. I just really enjoyed the social aspect of it, and yeah, it was fun. I never liked going very fast.

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But like it was a lot of the friends got asked to come work on farms because they knew how to. Well, at the time, I didn't know anything. So it was like, hey, I need to get my knowledge built up so I can go. hang out with my buddies, make a little money and go work on the farm.

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So through high school, our area is kind of outside of Appalachia, but it's stick and rock farming, lots of cedar trees, not very many crop ground. And so tobacco was in high school was still a huge crop. So if you were willing to go out and work in tobacco, you know, they would take in and Be happy to have you and get your base going from there. So that just kind of led into what it is today.

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You know, just working on the farms, getting some ground lease and then into the operation that it's turned into because of both of us. It's not just me. So did you sell the horse girl hay? So basically, yeah, it's funny. I was trying to, we were coming on here and I was like, I got to think of a joke with this. You're not supposed to bury the horse crazy there.

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No, but I was like, everybody was tired. I'm retired. Oh, yeah. I'm tired. Yeah, well, when we showed up, I was like in the same thing. But, hey, we're great, you know. No, basically, the joke was, you know, everybody looks at me like, how did he pull her off? I'm like, well, she had two horses when we met.

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Genius. Genius. Because it weeds out a bunch of people who would say, oh, my gosh, I'm not even going to call this girl because she's six foot four. You know, very. Yeah. So Colin showed up and like the gentleman that I am, I stood up to greet him and shook his hand. And he said the first thing he came out of his mouth, he said, I'm so glad you're not six foot four. Yeah.

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But there was a picture of me next to a horse. Like, I'm not a super tall gal. So I thought he would have used context clues, but. No, she, I just thought he didn't pay attention to the profile, what it said, six foot four. No, he, he totally, first thing. No, I did. He said, oh my gosh, you're not six foot four. No. That's, So you did see it? I did see it, yeah. But it didn't stop you?

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No, I said, man, we're going to. He showed up. Challenge accepted, right? Yeah, he showed up. He did. Because you're not. How tall are you? He's like 5'10 on a good day. No, 5'10.

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Or not 100,000, but about 1,000 roe bales somewhere in there. Lexington area is thoroughbred capital of the world, so big demand for good quality hay. A lot gets shipped in from out west, and a lot of the horses like the color. But if you are able to grow it homegrown and have a good quality, people buy it right up. Everything small squares or— Yeah.

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So yeah, small squares, the big square balers on our terrain and the horsepower that's needed for them doesn't really fit our area. And then there's a lot of women in the area and a lot of the horse trainers and things like that have younger people and they need the smaller 50 pound bale. I've had customers look and be like, I want a 40 pound bale. I don't care if it's the same money. I got you.

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Are you using like accumulators and all that stuff? Yeah. So we've got, uh, 1840, uh, master Ferguson inline Baylor. We just switched to, I guess I shouldn't have said on deer base, but, uh, real. No, I like a three 48. We had one before, but, um, being where we are high traffic, small role, small roads with telephone poles, right on the road. So we got to get up and down the road. Easy.

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So we got the, uh, Coons accumulator, 15 bale and just gravels. And, uh, we're teetering on the edge of trying to either get another baler and another accumulator. Cause we're about max capacity on the two and three in the morning.

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Hoop barns are pretty popular, but that's mainly for the roe bales, to be honest with you. Luckily, the accounts that we have will buy off the wagon. Oh, nice. So as long as we can get it, we get it up, get it on the wagon, stacked, strapped, we deliver it to their door, we come back the next day, get our wagon. You don't have to unload it? No. No. That's what I always hated about it. Yeah.

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Discounted price for that. But for what we were getting unloading, it didn't pencil out. Yeah. I want to get to the social media side of things, but before we do, I can't go over it. You guys both didn't grow up on a farm. Mm-mm. But you own land now. That's a really good accomplishment. So we've got to be missing something in between there, right? How did that happen?

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We get that question all the time. We've got young listeners. A lot of them, they say, well, how can I get into farming? My parents don't farm, and I want to get into farming. How'd you do it? Well, first, I'd like to just say, get you a good partner that supports it. Tried to throw that in there. Yeah.

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No, basically, what you do, I mean, there's a book called Land Rich, Cash Poor, Brian Reinzinger. I think I said his last name. And Small book, interesting book. I don't like to read, but I'll listen. I listen to you guys. That's a lot of podcasts. Um, he goes through basically the last hundred years of just troubles, you know, like, like everybody talks now, oh, you can't buy land and farm it.

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It's too hard. It's too this. Well, your great grandparents had the great depression, you know, the, the fifties, I believe there was another time.

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Um, the area we live in, we weren't planning on subdividing it, but you can go down to a 40 acre partial and the end of the farm is very hilly and about five acres of road front or five acres of grass. And then the rest of it's woods to river. So we were like, we're not going to use that anyway, but we'll, we can recoup some money and then swing the payment. Um,

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But if it wasn't for the relationships of leasing the land, that farm would have went straight to the market, been listed, or went to auction, and nothing would have ever been known about it. And at that point, we would have never had a chance at it. So leasing farms and taking care of your landlords is very important, you know.

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But how do you even get into the leasing if you didn't have the farming? You're a fight and fire. Yes, sir. You're a fight and fire. You can't tell? No.

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no that's a well you do you do throw those jabs out there you know you make some runs and go up to a nice farm that's kind of local and you help them up and you're like oh who's taking care of the place oh you need some help oh man i love farming on my days off you know yeah now um basically um so back to my uncle's story um i was helping him and this was back 2010, maybe so.

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It was a long time ago, yeah. The gentleman that had lived on that farm pulled up to the neighbor's house looking for somebody to mow hay. And I was sitting on a Massey Ferguson 574 with a little six-foot disc bind, or a Vicon disc mower. And he said, y'all looking for any more hay? I said, man, I think we're about packed, but what do you got? And he said, oh, about 150 acres.

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yachts and fine art and cyber security and they'll ensure concert venues so but equine is very small um but i like it it's a great way for me to still be involved in the horse industry and that's that's my niche you know that's what i know about that's that's what i can be involved in so it's nice i sit at a desk and don't have to be in the elements scooping manure so it's nice

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What do you insure a horse for? That's what I was thinking. You don't insure... I bet it's expensive. So we do like a mortality policy. So if you go out and, you know, you want a nice show horse, maybe you spend $20,000 on the horse, you want to insure your investment. But then you can also get major medical coverage on the horse if it gets sick or has a lameness issue.

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There's all sorts of coverage. Transit coverage. You got to import your horse from Holland. You got to come... Yeah, I mean, it's... And it's a... It can be taxing. You know, Colin, I think, has a pretty taxing career with the fire department. And, you know, you see a lot of stuff. And my job, I think, can be hard on me because I see a lot of the worst of worst of worst ownership.

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You know, I'm on the phone with them at 2 a.m. when, you know, we're in surgery. You know, poor, everyone's crying. You know, it's a lot. And so it's fulfilling to me because I can be there for those people in that time of need and crisis and tragedy and whatever. And then tell them you're getting paid from your coverage so everyone's happy.

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You might think Iowa just grows corn, but the truth is corn grows Iowa. I'm Joe Roberts, Iowa Corn Promotion Board President and farmer from Wright County. Checkoff dollars open local and global markets for corn and corn products. Together, we're investing in research for new uses, growing and expanding global markets, and increasing consumer knowledge of the over 4,000 products made from corn.