Bison industry looks to beef up consumption

The bison industry is looking for ways to sell more buffalo meat and help ranchers struggling through lean times – starting with one city as a test.

By Blake Nicholson
The Associated Press Denver Post

The Denver-based National Bison Association has done extensive research over the past year trying to find the best way to reach consumers, said Dave Carter, its executive director.

In spring, the group will pick one city for a study on building markets for bison in restaurants, retail groceries and other outlets.

The association will target either Indianapolis; Nashville, Tenn.; or Madison, Wis., Carter said.

In the 1990s, the association’s focus was on production. Now, "the direction we’ve been given by the members is, ‘Job No. 1 is develop the meat market,"’ Carter said. "They want us to help with building the right environment."

Some bison ranchers in recent years have taken to marketing their meat products on their own.

Ted Turner, the Atlanta-based media mogul who is considered the nation’s largest bison rancher, is developing a chain of restaurants that specialize in bison.

The North Dakota Buffalo Association started a program in which members buy and stock supermarket freezers, said Dennis Swanson, the association’s president.

Other ranchers have started their own marketing companies, such as the Dakota Territory Buffalo Co. of rural Mandan, N.D. The business recently landed a $21,000 state grant to market bison hot dogs and other meat products under the Cannonball Co. label.

The bison industry thrived for much of the 1990s, when many ranchers made big profits selling breeding animals. The breeding market has now dried up, and meat production has outpaced demand in recent years, leading to rock-bottom prices for ranchers at the sales rings.

Calves that just a few years ago were bringing thousands of dollars are now selling for a few hundred dollars or even less, said Diane Givan, office manager at Kist Livestock in Mandan.

"There can’t be much more downward potential from here," Swanson said.

The biggest factor behind the industry’s collapse is the initial emphasis on breeding animals, and the widely held belief that bison was a niche market that would never fall victim to a glut of meat, he said.

"We all did what we do best – production," Swanson said. "We probably should have paid a little more attention to marketing early on. A lot of producers … weren’t looking long term, they were looking short term."

Dennis Sexhus, chief executive officer of the North American Bison Cooperative, said business has more than doubled for the co-op in the past year. The co-op also is broadening its sales base, moving from upscale restaurants to other eateries and also retail groceries.

However, the co-op still has about a year’s worth of inventory in its freezers and welcomes efforts to increase consumption, he said.

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