The Corn Feed

Agvocates across the country and world are using social media to help consumers better promote the importance of dairy to the economy, healthy diets and our farming culture. With this in mind, we launched the Web Moo.0 Contest to find out how the dairy industry is using tools such as Facebook, blogs and Twitter to agvocate.

Since the contest launched in June (which also happened to be National Dairy Month), we have read great entries from very enthusiastic, tech-savvy and knowledgeable industry people. We’re excited to finally announce our winners!

Congratulations to our grand prize winner Ashley Messing, a fifth-generation dairy producer in Michigan who agvocates on her personal blog, Facebook and @armessing Twitter account. With her blog post “Agvocating at its Best,” Ashley didn’t just tell us how she uses social media, she showed us. Here is an excerpt from Ashley’s entry:

By the end of our conversation the daughter asked to get a photo with me because she said I wasn’t anything like she thought a farmer would be. She was going to show all of her friends and tell them all about her experience at Breakfast on the Farm. Honestly, these experiences make me thankful for all of the work I do. In these moments I see what we do pays off, all of the agvocating and communicating. It made my 6 hours of driving, both ways, worth the time and effort.

Ashley will receive registration and travel expenses to the first AgChat Foundation Agvocacy 2.0 Conference at the end of August in Chicago. We can’t wait to hear about all of the great things she will learn and people she will meet.

In addition, congratulations to Marianne Friers of New York and Nancy Grossi of California, our contest runner-ups. Marianne and Nancy will receive Flip Mino Cameras to help them put sights and sounds to their slices of the dairy industry. We look forward to posting videos from both of them here on the blog.

Be sure to check out Marianne’s Northview Diary blog, which she created after writing a weekly farm column for her local newspaper. We thought her combination of old and new media shows how the dairy industry can use both outlets to spread its messages:

I saw blogging as a timelier and more personal way to make a connection with non-farm folks in order to tell them the real story about dairy farming. It has been a tremendous amount of fun and has worked out fairly well I think. Today if you Google “Dairy blog” you will usually find Northview Diary at or near the top of the search results. The best part of blogging about dairy has been daily contact with folks all over the world, some from farm families, but many who have never touched a cow or set foot in a dairy barn.

Nancy impressed us with her obvious passion for agvocacy, which she demonstrates daily on her Wife of a Dairyman blog, @wifeofadairyman Twitter account and Facebook page. Here’s part of her entry:

It was time for me to stand up and do my part, to reach out to the consumer, the community and as many people as I can reach to share my personal story of agriculture.  I believe that sharing my account of what it’s like to live and work, day to day, on a working dairy ranch is extremely important.  I also believe the information I make available, through my blog (The Wife of a Dairyman), Facebook and Twitter will give the public a better understanding and a connection with true agriculture.

Once again, congratulations to Ashley, Marianne and Nancy. A big thank you also goes out to all of our entrants and those who helped promote the contest on their blogs, Twitter accounts and Facebook pages. We’d love to keep the conversation going on Twitter @NutriDense and on Facebook at facebook.com/NutriDense.