Organic Valley hits record $1.2bn in sales

14-Jun-2021 - Last updated on 14-Jun-2021 at 08:30 GMT

An increase in conscious shopping choices by individuals across the country helped the cooperative uphold a stable pay price for its organic family farms.

Related tags Organic Dairy Milk

US dairy company Organic Valley has recorded sales of $1.2bn for the year ending 2020.

In spite of the pandemic, Organic Valley said it held a stable pay price for its family farms, improved financials, and grew a steady demand for organic milk and dairy.

"Farms continue to disappear at an alarming rate while the number of animals grows steadily, producing food in systems designed without regard for the long-term, holistic benefit of people, animals, and the environment," said Bob Kirchoff, Organic Valley CEO.

"We are here to offer an alternative: an opportunity for organic family farms to thrive. Family farms care for animals, steward natural resources, produce nourishing food, strengthen rural communities, and pass that care on from one generation to the next, giving all of us a better food system for tomorrow."

As more people chose to cook healthy food from home in 2020, Organic Valley experienced consolidated sales growth of 4.5%. An increase in conscious shopping choices by individuals across the country helped the cooperative uphold a stable pay price for its organic family farms.

"Our farmers produced exceptionally high-quality products and exemplified cooperation each step of the way," said Arnie Trussoni, Organic Valley farmer-member and 2020 board president.

"Employees remained steadfast in their commitment to the co-op, overcoming the challenges of remote work, homeschooling, and childcare, and our essential on-site workers showed up every day to make sure we kept getting farmers' products out the door. As we reflect on what's happened in the world around us this past year, uncertainty and insecurity were common themes. But the last year for CROPP was the opposite—it was a year marked by strength and stability."

By driving net income, reducing debt, holding pay price, and returning dollars to farmers, Organic Valley made progress in 2020 it said will support a long-term future for organic family farms. Compared to 2019, the nation's largest organic farmer-owned cooperative improved consolidated net income by $48.4m in 2020.

1 comment

Hard to Believe

Posted by Steve Schotthofer, 14 June 2021 - 12:29 GMT

Coming form an organization that has destroyed more family farms than a lot of cooperatives it is very difficult to find credibility in anything positive coming from Organic Valley. Between playing favoritism among their so called family of farmers to enforcing cooperative mandates and rules unevenly amongst their producers, Organic Valley never tells the "Real" story behind their operation. What about the regions that the co-op sets up business, taxes the farmers out of existence through applying unethical fees for operating within their system, and then after financially starving the farmers for several years, then just up and pulls out of the region and puts the final blow onto the family farms that worked so hard to overcome the costs to certify and retool their farms. Organic Valley has done this repeatedly to farmers across the Country in different regions many times and in some regions, they have done it more than once. Organic Valley has a tried and true method to manage their milk supply --- when the co-op has too much milk and their sales are soft, instead of stepping up to the plate and working harder at marketing, the co-op sets up "new" and extra rules and starts harassing their producers out of business. Just look back over the last 2 decades and see how craftily the co-op implemented their method of balancing milk in different regions of the Country during different economic times. Organic Valley is never about it's farmers, but instead it is all about it's stockholders, whom they will turn inside out to pay a dividend to , all the while taking that income out of the hide of their producing farmers. This is NOT a co-op that is as pretty as it portay's to the unaware public in the grocery stores. Another item of interest is that Organic Valley holds up its largest producers with the large commercial sized dairies and the robots as their "poster children" of the organization, not the small hard working family farmer that they advertise and market about. Truly a wolf in sheep's clothing. There is nothing much wholesome left about the dealings and activities of Organic Valley. A once admirable and truly good cooperative from years back that has wandered far from it's origins and many of it's founders principles.

Report abuse