Tell us about yourself
I come from a farming family in Hanmer, which is a village on the Welsh side of the North Shropshire / Welsh Border. I joined Wynnstay in 2020 in the middle of the first coronavirus lockdown. My internal claim to fame is that it took me four separate attempts between 2011 and 2020 to break into the Wynnstay business. I’ve attended Harper Adams a couple of times and have qualifications in Business Management, Marketing & Ruminant Nutrition. I’ve worked in Ruminant Nutrition roles since finishing University in 2011 with my ambition being to reach my current role as a Dairy Technical Specialist.
Tell us about the role of a dairy specialist at Wynnstay
As a Dairy Technical Specialist, I provide support to the sales team by supporting our farmer customers. The core of the role is formulating diets but there’s a lot more to it. As well as problem-solving on farm we aim to bring new ideas to our customer's businesses. We research new products and assess whether they will be of benefit, along with what we can do to help our customers with emerging challenges in agriculture, such as low carbon feeds and helping dairy farmers to achieve net-zero without compromising profit or performance.
The Dairy Technical Services can always advise in a way that is in the farmer's best interest. The sales team often tell me that Dairy Technical is the wrong name for our department and it should be Ruminant Technical Specialist as we also support them with Youngstock, Beef & Sheep nutrition as well. The Dairy Technical Services team can always advise in a way that is in the farmer's best interest. Contrary to our name, we advise on youngstock, beef and sheep, as well as dairy, and are in reality Ruminant Technical Specialists.
What aspects of your role do you enjoy the most?
The part of my role that gives me the most enjoyment and satisfaction is when a farmer gives me feedback on the benefits that have come from what we’ve done. Usually, I’m brought into a farm to help with things like increasing milk production, milk solid production, lowering costs, improving growth rates or eliminating herd health and transition problems. When someone tells me that they’ve gone from 20-30 milk fevers a month to 2 or 3 a year, or their conception rate has never been so high, or that cows have never milked as well as they have on my recommendations (My record so far is +12 litres/cow/day without any extra concentrates) I really feel the meaning and enjoyment in what I do. Knowing that I’ve made a difference to both the animals on a farm but also the people that care for them is my biggest driver and brings me the most enjoyment.
What are the challenges you face in your role and how do you overcome them?
Knowing how to advise farmers regarding the purchase of farm inputs in such a volatile climate. The prices of inputs have moved so much in the last 12 months and its almost impossible to judge whether prices will come down or keep moving up in the coming months. There’s plenty of global factors to suggest that prices will move up further, but there’s almost as many that suggest it could ease back. Knowledge of these factors, as well as economic principals such as laws of supply and demand, inflation and financial risk management are the best ways I’ve found to overcome this challenge so far.
What is your key advice for farmers?
Don’t accept that things have to be a certain way just because they always have been that way. Farming involves a lot of daily routine and it can be easy to develop tunnel vision with daily routines. There is always someone that can help with almost any issue, particularly within Wynnstay where we have specialists for everything from Calves to Cows to Crops.
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Discover the roles currently available within the Wynnstay team.
