As COVID-19 crashed the meatpacking industry in the summer of 2020, many cattle ranchers stuck with animals searched desperately for ways to get their beef to hungry Americans. Meanwhile, hungry Americans found meat aisle shelves empty and quantities limited to prevent panic buying, and began to search for other ways to buy meat.
For producers who had pivoted to direct-to-consumer marketing before the pandemic hit, the spike in sales was a welcome challenge during an otherwise brutal year. But for those who had instead invested in farm-to-table marketing channels, the pandemic carried a double-whammy: processors were so backed up that the price for live animals plummeted, while their restaurant customers closed up or saw dramatically diminished volume, collapsing demand.
For Bob Prosser, co-owner of the Bar T Bar ranch near Flagstaff, Arizona, it was a reminder of how far they had come, and of how far apart their operation is from the mainstream beef business. The Bar T Bar is one of two ranches to sell most of their product directly to Diablo Burger, “an Arizona local foods-based burger joint” according to their website, with locations in Flagstaff and Tucson. The restaurants are the brain child of Derrick Widmark, who launched them in 2008 while serving as executive director of Diablo Trust, a private conservation collaborative that Prosser had co-founded to fight back during the cattle wars of the early 90s.
“Cow-free by ’93, now that was a real onslaught,” says Prosser. “We formed an alliance to try to resolve these conflicts.” The Bar T Bar and their neighbor, the Flying M, formed Diablo Trust to find an agreement with the Forest Service on management goals that preserved their grazing leases. But even after years of planning, meetings, and negotiation had led to an award-winning progressive management plan, the extra effort wasn’t reflected in the price of their product in the market. So Diablo Trust started exploring ways for the community around Flagstaff that was benefiting from their stewardship to support the ranches. Other local ranchers told Prosser and Widmark to their faces that selling beef locally just couldn’t work. Widmark “took that kind of personally,” says Prosser.
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Louis Wertz 