Albert and Walter's latest brainchild

[knabe]

government mandates it's ever expanding reach.

that's clearly not healthy either.

nobody cares.

nobody cares about anything anymore while freedom and liberty disappears and non-citizens have more rights to taxpayer dollars than taxpayers.

 

[Aussie]

Well all I can say is get used to it people. The Packer I buy for has a new program called never ever.
No hormones
No antibiotics ever
Free range ( never confined to a feedlot)
100% grass fed
Pasture raised
Full life trace back
This program is becoming huge for us with demand world wide very strong and the biggest market the US. Teys that is mentioned by A&W is a packer like us.

 

[mark tenenbaum]

There isnt nearly enough grass due to various conditions especially land prices to produce large amounts of grass fed organic beef in this country O0

 

[justintime]

My main problem with this is with what A&W did not say in their new promotional release. I attended a meeting a couple nights ago which was attended by many urban people. This topic came up during a coffee break, and one lady said she was concerned to buy beef from the grocery store anymore. I asked her why and she said she had read the new A&W press release and it said that they would be offering a safer product from now on. To her, this meant that there had to be something wrong with the beef supply that every consumer buys. I tried to tell her that this was just an A&W decision to provide a specialized product and to gain more market share. By the comments around the table, I think many of the people there were siding with the lady who thought the beef they were feeding their families was suspect.

I agree that A&W should be able to purchase their beef wherever they want to do so. What I don't like is their " insinuation that they will now be offering a safer and more ecological product. It almost laughable when they say " the burgers they will offer, will leave a smaller environmental footprint".  That is definitely a statement aimed at the urban consumer. As I said earlier, I just dislike what isn't said in their new promotion.

To me this is just another smack for today's beef producers who have worked overtime to provide a safe and ethically raised product. I happen to believe our beef supply is the highest quality product the industry has ever provided. I am just tired of corporations like this, once again, trying to gain market share with no regard to the hard working beef producers who bend over backwards to make this happen. I understand that life oftentimes isn't fair but I also understand that when an injustice appears, we should try to correct it rather than just shrug our shoulders and accept it.

A&W's Canadian corporate headquarters is in Vancouver, BC, which is the heartland of Canada's earth muffin geeks. It sure sounds to me like they have managed to work their way to the board table at A&W.

 

[RyanChandler]

My main problem with this is with what A&W did not say in their new promotional release. I attended a meeting a couple nights ago which was attended by many urban people. This topic came up during a coffee break, and one lady said she was concerned to buy beef from the grocery store anymore. I asked her why and she said she had read the new A&W press release and it said that they would be offering a safer product from now on. To her, this meant that there had to be something wrong with the beef supply that every consumer buys. I tried to tell her that this was just an A&W decision to provide a specialized product and to gain more market share. By the comments around the table, I think many of the people there were siding with the lady who thought the beef they were feeding their families was suspect.

I agree that A&W should be able to purchase their beef wherever they want to do so. What I don't like is their " insinuation that they will now be offering a safer and more ecological product. It almost laughable when they say " the burgers they will offer, will leave a smaller environmental footprint".  That is definitely a statement aimed at the urban consumer. As I said earlier, I just dislike what isn't said in their new promotion.

To me this is just another smack for today's beef producers who have worked overtime to provide a safe and ethically raised product. I happen to believe our beef supply is the highest quality product the industry has ever provided. I am just tired of corporations like this, once again, trying to gain market share with no regard to the hard working beef producers who bend over backwards to make this happen. I understand that life oftentimes isn't fair but I also understand that when an injustice appears, we should try to correct it rather than just shrug our shoulders and accept it.

A&W's Canadian corporate headquarters is in Vancouver, BC, which is the heartland of Canada's earth muffin geeks. It sure sounds to me like they have managed to work their way to the board table at A&W.

What information do you have access to that would suggest it's not? or shouldn't be? Who provided you w/ that information?  Who funded the research of the conclusion you subscribed to?

The effort of beef producers "trying to provide safe and ethically raised beef" isn't in question here. 

The question is: "Are producers provided with RELIABLE information, regarding the safety of the products their sold, so that that can make an INFORMED opinion to provide the consumer w/ safe beef?" 

 

[chambero]

We sell our commercial calves to a natural beef program.  We get audited by a third party.  The audit company flys someone in and we have to go through our computer records with them and then take them on a very detailed site visit to our pastures and working facilities.  We've done it twice now, and when I'm finished - although we easily "pass" the audit - I have a kind of sense of being violated when I'm done.  For example, they want to see detailed records of calving and want to know which animals had assisted births.  That has no relevance to an animal being sold to the feedlot that hired them, but they ask it. And on and on and on.

We did this to ourselves so we are going to have to live with it.  The scary part about what A&W is doing if I read it correctly - along with some "branded beef" type operations tied to specific ranches (think Nolan Ryan), is that this sounds like it is setting up corporation to corporation buying agreements - almost along the lines of the Walmart model.  If you want to learn what getting the screws to you feels like, talk to a company that has to try to sell their products to Walmart.  I've heard some absolute horror stories.  This concept may be what gets giant corporate agriculture control of beef production.  Up until this point, they've stayed out of the cow-calf side due to the capital involved (low rates of return compared to land investment costs, etc).

I use Zilmax, implants, and other stuff on our show steers (yes - I feed my me and my kids beef that has seen Ace before).  Maybe that's why I get sleepy after lunch on Sunday.......However, common sense tells you that you are better off long-term eating meat that hasn't had added hormones, antibiotics, etc.  I have a graduate degree in the sciences and deal with chemical risk assessments all the time in my job, so I am relatively well-versed on this subject.  The FDA is flat out not openly "bribed" to approve drugs - so those comments are just being cynical.  But their risk analysis are based on observable effects in toxicology studies.  Not all of this "stuff" is measureable.  You've all heard about different chemicals that are found in random tests of human breast milk.  It doesn't make the news, but there are bad things going on right now with amphibians world-wide (think frogs) that look like they are likely attributable to synthetic chemicals that unintentionally emulate estrogen and other hormones.  Those kinds of chemicals are truly everywhere at very, very low doses (parts per trillion and lower).  Something disastrous is happening to bee populations.  NOBODY really knows what long term effects are of very low doses of synthetic chemicals and hormones.

Big picture - humans live a lot longer (probably longer than we should) because of the use of chemicals, drugs, and other man-made substances that dramatically reduced disease and improved nutrition at a cheap cost.  That doesn't mean there is not a bad side also.  Only the relatively rich can afford to worry about those potential bad sides.

I much more worried about the corporate buying power aspect of these things than I am health risks from non-natural raised cattle, but I'm afraid we are going to forced into playing the game whether we like it or not.

 

[trevorgreycattleco]

Shouldn't beef cattle producers raise beef that the consumer wants? Is it better to raise beef as we see fit and tell the customer this is how it is? I'm all for grass fed, free range, no antibiotics or hormones. There is a demand for this and it's growing. And people will pay a premium happily for it.

 

[cowboy_nyk]

Shouldn't beef cattle producers raise beef that the consumer wants? Is it better to raise beef as we see fit and tell the customer this is how it is? I'm all for grass fed, free range, no antibiotics or hormones. There is a demand for this and it's growing. And people will pay a premium happily for it.

You're right, but that's not the issue I have with A&W's approach.  They are not just providing "what the customer wants."  They are instilling fear of conventional beef production in order to change what the customer wants.  Those are not the same things.  If they just said: "Hey, we're going to sell only hormone free beef, end of story." There would be far less outrage.  They are essentially running a smear campaign to promote their product.