Jason Brown 0:00
My daughter, if I didn’t work in agriculture would have no reason to be on a farm. She would think all of her food came from the grocery store would not know anything about where any any of the food that we eat comes from, which is largely a part of my motivation for working in agriculture is to bring that connection to the farm back.

Nate Disarro 0:20
Hey, it’s Nate Disarro and welcome to Titans of Industry, the podcast where I talk to industry leaders and innovators who are at the top of their game and leading the pack in their fields uncovering some of the best stories in today’s business landscape. In this episode, I sit down with Jason Brown, a PR executive for the Arkansas Farm Bureau, which is a nonprofit private advocacy organization that worked with families throughout the state to improve the livelihood of farmers and their families. Jason is also the host of the Arkansas ag cast a podcast discussing the latest agriculture news in this state. And he’s the former president of prsa Arkansas chapter, he shares his insight about industry trends for the modern farmer and the importance of honoring where our food comes from. Now let’s get to the episode. But before we do, let’s talk about content, strategy and Video for marketing your business. Our team at content Titan is committed to great storytelling, no matter what industry you’re in, it’s crucial to engage, entertain, inform and captivate your audience. And video is the best way to do it. Having worked with people and organizations of all shapes and sizes, our team has the experience to deliver the right content at the right price. We are easy to do business with and we know how to get you results. Visit content titan.co to learn more. Now, here’s the episode with Jason Brown. Jason, thanks for jumping on the podcast. Hey, appreciate you coming in. It’s weird. I’m having some strange deja vu. But you know, sometimes that just happens. We’ve been here before. Well, you have your own podcast that you host. But I’d love for our listeners be able to just get a little insight into who you are what you do how you got here. Yeah, get away.

Jason Brown 2:10
So I guess I’ll start from the President. I’m Director of Policy communications at Arkansas Farm Bureau. Everybody is when they hear from Bureau they think about insurance. Little do they know that insurance, the insurance companies owned by something called the oxtail Farm Bureau Federation. We’re a much smaller organization. We are advocacy based and work to help advance the farming and agriculture industry in Arkansas. So I’ll work on that side of things. I don’t I don’t know anything about your insurance rates or things like that. Yeah, so I’m Director of Policy communications. And that’s important because really, we were policy based organization, everything we do is about developing policy from from the ground up and policies that help again help and advance the ag industry in Arkansas. So. So really spend all my time thinking about agriculture. And that makes me really happy. Because several years ago, when I started my career, in public relations, agriculture would played a role a small role in in the work I did every day, in addition to manufacturing and healthcare and education and things like that. And over time, I became just really, really interested in agriculture and wanting to spend, find a way to spend all my time working on and thinking about agriculture. I eventually went on to a startup out of Boston, Massachusetts, it’s the first unicorn in ag tech. And that was really exciting, spent a couple years there left there, to do consulting work for them and some others in Arkansas Farm Bureau and eventually joined up and have been there for some time now. And

Nate Disarro 4:13
yeah, have fun.

Jason Brown 4:14
Yeah, it’s great. It’s, as I was telling you, I spent the morning in a bee suit. And had been in meetings since lunch, and now we get to talk. So I never know what my day is gonna be like. And that’s one thing I love about working in agriculture. Well, that’s

Nate Disarro 4:33
one things I love about the industry. We’re in to, you know, we’re out telling stories, meeting people talking to people in different industries all the time. And we never really know what what’s going to happen day to day, you know, we plan we schedule things. We think we have an idea and then we show up and you know, there may be somebody in a bee suit that we had no idea was going to happen. Yeah. So we’ll get to that a little bit more in a minute. But PR communications you know, it’s a world that sort of sometimes gets meshed in with the rest of marketing or in some industries, just general communications, but break it down for me from, you know, the work that you do, because you’re both advocacy at a public level public advocacy as well as the PR side of things, right?

Jason Brown 5:19
Yeah. So sometimes, sometimes that involves media. Sometimes that involves educating consumers about farming practices, or different applications of inputs and things like that. Sometimes it involves taking the work that we’ve done supporting FFA or four h, something like that, and amplifying that to a level where, you know, so many more people can hear about it, you and I’ve talked on occasion, and we talked about sort of defining the role or the industry of public relations and, and it’s simply just building and maintaining relationships between an organization and its audience or a company and its stakeholders or its customers, whatever, you know, whatever that language may be. It’s, it’s, it’s making and maintaining relationships. So, you know, that can be that can be done in a number of ways. Certainly, you know, a lot of people mainly think about media, I don’t know, you might think about cocktail parties, when you hear public relations. I don’t know, I think about that meme that went around a few years ago. It’s like what my parents think I do what my friends think I do, you know, that sort of thing. I think public relations fall squarely into that, like, no one knows what I do. My wife, we’ve been married 12 years, she doesn’t know I do but. But it’s really about those relationships, building and maintaining those. And that can be through media, that can be through using our own content channels, whether it be social media channels, the website, a newsletter, it can literally be through the spoken word, someone walking up in front of a group of influencers, or legislators or Kiwanis club or something like that, and just communicating about things that are important to us or issues we think you should be thinking about, you know, so a number of ways to, to it can it can wear, we wear many hats, because our job is is ultimately building and maintaining those relationships through communications.

Nate Disarro 7:34
Farming is a is one of those industries that probably the majority of city dwellers like myself, don’t think about every day, we eat three square meals a day and you know, show up at a restaurant or the grocery store, and there’s the food and we just take it and we go home and cook it or somebody cooks it for us or whatever the case may be. But it’s it’s probably one of the biggest and most complex industries there is and you know, certainly covers the most square footage, square mileage square acreage worldwide, but what’s it like being able to communicate, navigate on the, you know, for these people that essentially without them, none of us are around? You know, we’re back in the stone age’s.

Jason Brown 8:21
Yeah, so one cool thing about farming is farmers enjoy, like a 90% Trust, right, I’m paraphrasing of a language here. But with the rest of the world, like it’s one of the most respected, trusted jobs, professions in all the world, and that’s a really good thing. You know, you talked about food, farmers are also producing the products that made the clothes that we’re wearing. In some cases, providing, you know, the the energy that is operating the building, or vehicles and, you know, touch a touch a lot of different aspects. And it’s really, when I think about that, it’s really a gift. You know, I think about the opportunity to be a part of an industry that that has such an impact. It’s it really is a gift to be able to be involved in that. One of the challenges is in the 30s. In Arkansas, we just went back and pulled a bunch of census data a decade, but by every census from 1935, and in the 30s 80% or so of our Kansans lived in rural areas of the state. Today, it’s the exact opposite 80 Over 80% of our population lives in urban areas. And so we’re so disconnected none of us are probably more than three generations from the farm if I had to guess. I think it’d be really hard to find someone He was further than than three generations from the farm. But you know, what, we are steadily losing our connection to the farm, my daughter, if I didn’t work in agriculture would have no reason to be on a farm, she would think all of her food came from the grocery store would not know anything about where bacon comes from, or where, you know, any, any of the food that we eat comes from, which is largely a part of my motivation for working in agriculture is to bring that connection to the farm, back, there’s a huge trend of knowing where your food comes from right now. But really, what that has been is maybe meeting the farmer at a farmers market or something like that. We don’t really know how our food is grown anymore, we don’t really know that processes, even the path that it takes from the field to get to your table. And I just have, over over time, just developed a real personal passion for understanding that and helping other people understand that.

Nate Disarro 11:09
You mentioned that. I know we’ve talked before that, you know, farmers and generally the people that that live and work on farms may not fit the bill of what we might think of stereotypically, as you know, a middle school education can’t complete their sentences. You name it, often ever

Jason Brown 11:30
seen a farmer wear overalls? Believe it or not. But often

Nate Disarro 11:35
there’s some of the coolest people we’re gonna meet. Right? Talk to me about just sort of the mentality of your everyday farmer. I mean, is it somebody that, you know, drives a 1972? Ford pickup? And you know, I don’t know, you know, you see these movies and the stereotypes out there. Sure.

Jason Brown 11:52
Yeah. I mean, even now, even current movies being made, sort of facilitate some of those stereotypes that we have. Yeah, we joke a lot. I keep a photo art project that my daughter did in kindergarten, I keep it pinned up in my office. And it’s, it’s her face on a on a farmer’s body. And it’s literally a straw hat on her head in the picture. And wearing overalls and like, you know, black boots or something like that. And, again, I’ve never literally never seen I’ve worked in this field for over a decade, never seen a farmer wear overalls, you know. And so we do have that stereotype. But you know, we talk a lot about broadband. You and I have talked about this issue, rural broadband. If you read, if you read the newspaper, if you read Twitter, if you watch the news, if you listen to the news, especially in the state of Arkansas right now, you’re hearing though the word broadband or rural rural connectivity, you know, you’re hearing something along these lines. The reason is, there’s a lot of reasons but one big reason is our, our farmers use technology every day in the work that they do. It’s nothing to open a combine door, crawl up in it, and see 234 iPads, their GPS guided, we think our podcast plays pretty well, because farmers need something to do in the combine in some cases, you know, because it’s being driven by GPS coordinates. A farmer could be sitting at dinner and pull up and say, well, they’re harvesting this field. And we’re we’re averaging 65 acres 65 bushels an acre of soybeans right now. Like, that’s, that’s really good. I can make a marketing decision, right, I can sell some of those beans, because I know how much I’m harvesting right now. It’s really a tech forward work like the rest of us, you know, but it’s really a tech forward world. I know, traditionally, you’ve seen wives involved in a farming operation, they sort of cooked lunch or took took that, that role on that, that that we sometimes used to see on television, and now, you know, they are a big part of the operation. I mean, you know, in making some decisions, or acting as an influence or acting as that Chief Communications Officer, in some cases, you know, playing a very different role on the farm than we used to than we used to see. So, yeah, I mean, farmers are not who we’ve been taught to believe they are in a lot of cases, they’re, they’re really interested in doing things differently. They’re really interested in doing things more efficiently. Because farming is fairly simple. Someone will call me out on this but I’ve many times I’ve not heard objection. Farming is really simple. There. My outputs outnumber my inputs. And it’s, it’s really that basic. And so farmers want to be as efficient. Use as little inputs and products as possible. Because it cost them money, they can make more profit when they do that. So farmers are really, really running a front office business now more than more than ever, to make their their operations more efficient, which workout for us, it means there’s food in the grocery store when we go there.

Nate Disarro 15:32
You mentioned how advanced farming has become as far as the technology involved, and you spent time at the first unicorn in the ag tech world. So what are some of the things you know, GPS guided combines? Or, you know, whatever? Yeah, what are some of the cool things that are happening in the in the ag tech world that you see? Yeah, so

Jason Brown 15:52
tech is, is really would be at the forefront of that. And, and, you know, some of these things, we’ve mentioned GPS guided tractor. That That means not just within a harvest scenario, but in planting scenario. So I can plant a straighter row, which means I can get more rows I can, I can be accurate on the spacing between rows, which means I can get more rows, I can do some things like you know, I can, I can be more efficient in the planting and harvest of the crop. There’s also technology with within irrigation, we talked about poly pipe irrigation. This is a large plastic, it looks like you’ve laid out the longest trash bag in the world at the end of a field when it rolls out. And then we tie one end of it to a to a whale. And then the other end of it we close off. So when we turn the water on, that thing fills up with the water. And then we go through and we punch holes in a way that all the water gets to the end of that field at the same amount of time. So if that field looks like a triangle, water would traditionally get to one in faster than it does the other. This gets the water all there at the same amount of time. So different flow rates based on the shape of the field means much less water usage, which means we’re taking less water out of the aquifer, which means farmers utility costs are down because they’ve got to use a fuel driven pumps to get that water out of the ground. So we’re using less water, we’re using less full fuel we’re using. And we’re capturing that water sometimes at the end to pick it up and use it somewhere else. So that’s somewhat of a technology efficiency. But it’s also efficiency just in how we use the resources that exists. And then in some cases, it’s pulling back on practices. So we’re almost feels like we’re taking a step back in time. No Till. So that’s a that’s a production practice where at the end of the year, we’re not going to go back and tool that field up, we’re just gonna leave it alone and leave the roots there, the residue of the plant that we harvested there, which, again, is an efficiency of sustainability played. When the roots when there’s roots in the dirt. When that wind starts blowing in wintertime, that dirt won’t blow off, it helps capture more rainwater, which means we have to apply less water, with our irrigation systems, all because we’re doing things the way that we did 6070 years ago, you know, so in some cases, we take setback, and a lot of cases we take steps forward. Those are just a few really basic examples of how, you know farmers have evolved over time. And in really it all of that is driven by technology, even no till was, you know, was was was generated because we use technology to measure data points and things instead of making assumptions. So technology plays a really important role.

Nate Disarro 19:06
Well, you know, talking about the the plastic piping, quick shout out to Delta plastics, we’ve done some work with him in the past and, you know, other great companies doing the same thing but But the coolest part of that is it’s a very simple piece of plastic that you roll out. And you literally take a thing with a point and poke holes in it wherever you need to. Yeah, but they’ve also got really advanced software that’s helping to understand the grain of the field and sort of all the angles and everything that goes into it so that the farmers not guessing there’s no guesswork involved. Yeah, it’s a high tech operation even though you’re using some seemingly low tech tools to go with that.

Jason Brown 19:46
I may have shared this with you but last summer I spent some time with a with a water engineer with the University of Arkansas Division mag, Dr. Chris Henry and he really There’s a lot of research within soil moisture sensors and your listeners and viewers certainly didn’t come here to get a lesson on how to farm. So, but I think this is just speaks to the point of things that that the general consumer audience does care about. And that is, the farmers being the best steward of resources that they possibly can. So moisture sensors, farmers have, almost always since irrigation has been around irrigated on a schedule, hey, we haven’t had an inch of rain this week. So let’s give the the crop an inch of rain, the sensors are actually telling the farmer with through the use of an app or an iPhone, hey, look, you don’t need to water because your your ground is your soil has held on to the last rain that we’ve gotten, or you should water, but maybe it’s half what you think it should be. So we’re using real data, real ground truth to input or to educate us on the input decisions that we’re making. Again, some of that stuff’s not possible without Wi Fi, you know, without, without some of this infrastructure being built out in rural communities. And not to even think about the fact that, you know, farmers or people to they, they have spouses or partners that want to work from home, or kids who might need to do remote learning for one reason or another. I tell them that appointment, you know, I mean, all other aspects of life. And I think, I think that rural Bob broadband, which is a soapbox you didn’t expect me to get on. But I think that that’s one way I’m going to bring it full circle, that’s one way that we can get back to growing that rural population, again, like we were back in the 30s is when you can move out into a rural area, a county or the country, as we used to call it, I guess, and you can do that and still maintain the life that you that you had in the city, I think I think these things are important to grow back some of our rural communities. So

Nate Disarro 22:14
I think it’s 100% True. And, you know, we just had the opportunity to tell a story of former governor who was essentially partially responsible for the predecessor to rural broadband, which was rural paved roads, which you don’t even think that would be a big deal. But back in the day, that was their access to the market. And the you know, they had to get paved roads back there, so that they could, you know, get these trucks and probably before the trucks, the horse and buggy isn’t all that, you know, it’s, it’s not easy to go on a muddy dirt road or slightly gravel road to get all your, all your products from the farm to the market. And so we’re just really in the next phase of that sort of shift in society. And, you know, roads back then were important. Now, broadband is equally as important.

Jason Brown 23:01
Well, you know, Arkansas Farm Bureau, really, it came about it was a group of farmers that wanted to, you know, really make sure that rural electrification made its way to Arkansas, and they had electricity out there, just like you experienced in the cities. And we really view that broadband access, as being the same as electric electricity was back in the day I, I had an opportunity to talk to the grandson of the man who really started introducing the practice of pulling timber out of out of the woods with a truck rather than mules. And just think, if you’ve got the truck, but no roads to facilitate that, then that advancements not doing you any good. So these tools like sensors, or GPS, or, you know, whatever they may be a number of these tools that farmers are using, aren’t really doing that good if you go and pull up your speed test, and you’ve got two megabytes per second, you know, at home or at your farm shop. So we view this as a necessity, it’s no longer a luxury item anymore.

Nate Disarro 24:18
Okay, so with the advancement of tech, and the I would assume there’s higher efficiencies that now farmers can use on the farm with, you know, do people need to be behind the wheel of a tractor, if it’s being guided by GPS, things like that the way farms are run is much different now than than they used to be. Is it still is as manpower intensive, or are there a lot of technologies that are pulling some of that out and you’re using more machines and automation?

Jason Brown 24:50
Yeah, so, you know, I don’t know. You know, I’m not the certainly I’m not the expert on autonomous farm. equipment and implements like, you know, surely that’s in development. In another life, I worked with the number one forklift manufacturer in the world and got to see some of the coolest for self driving, you know, autonomous forklifts and pallet jacks and things like that. I’m out of my realm there when it comes to farm equipment. But but you know, labor is an issue on farms, just as it is at your local restaurant who’s cut service back to four days a week, because they can’t find labor, you know, farm, farm work is hard work. It’s not nine to five, it’s outside regardless of the ailments, it’s, you know, it’s it’s heavy lifting, it’s it’s hard work. And we’re finding the ag industry is finding it harder and harder to identify. And remember, we’re in this factory is sitting in a location where the population has reduced immensely over over time. So if you think about farming is a in that way. So the the, the labor pool is really not that big to begin with. And then you take the type of labor that you’re working with, it really becomes a challenge. So h2 a labor has really become has really gained a lot of momentum in the in the state, and that is Hga labor. If you’re not familiar, this is international labor force to come here, whether they be from Mexico, South African, you there’s even some European labor being utilized here in the state, it’s really become a growing part of the labor force, because we are back to your original question. I wandered a bit, but we are still really intensely relying on physical labor and don’t don’t see that changing drastically. And then in the near future, at least.

Nate Disarro 27:16
Talk to me a little bit about the the tourism side of the ag industry because that’s become something pretty interesting. We were talking about, you know, honey farm earlier today and and a lot of people are more interested now than they used to be about where their food comes from, and what is what actually happens on the farm. Are we seeing an increase in tourism?

Jason Brown 27:42
Yeah, so ag tourism is really taken off. You know, I’m certainly not that not the expert on on really any anything agriculture, I can share my perspective, but I believe Arkansas, I believe Parks and Tourism has added an element of agri tourism to what they’re doing. I know certainly Arkansas Farm Bureau has some interest in many others have interest in that. And then you’ve got national or international organizations. Harvest host may is one of them that that is really trying to draw upon that experience of being on a farm. The farm I was I was on this morning, has an aspect of agri tourism. Number one, they teach beekeeping classes, just about year round, which is really cool. You know, I asked about that. You know, in the city I live in I live in the city and and you know, I was asking like I’m always trying to think about ways that I can incorporate agriculture in my house or bees one of those things. Oh, yeah, totally, you know, the Yeah, beekeeping is, is totally something you can do in the backyard of your neighborhood home. But, you know, they have a tree farm out there. They sell some of the products that they raise. I saw I know, I saw goats out there. You know, we’ve got a couple of vineyards here in just in Central Arkansas, that offer event venues and things like that. Of course, you know, I don’t know when when this episode will air but in the fall always, you see pumpkins, pumpkin patches and corn mazes and, and hayrides in these types of activities is well you know, so there there’s a lot of different ways to be exposed to the agriculture industry as a consumer, I think about farmer’s markets. You know, as we talk as we are right now, farmers markets are starting to wrap up. But, but you know, farmers markets almost always have the farmer as their that grew that product and produce that food, and now they’re selling it to a great way to interact. And I guarantee you if you go out and you talk to those folks, they’ll say, Hey, you’re welcome to come out, you’re welcome to come out to my farm and see how I produce this. This food that you’re eating in, there are some notable farms around the state. Rabbit Ridge Ralston, you know, that invite people out on a regular basis, there’s, there’s some of those that are, you know, more of a more of a special occasion like the the events that I was talking about earlier. But But yeah, there’s agri tourism has been its, I’ll call it a win win. I know that’s a bit of a cliche, but it’s been a way for people to understand where their food comes from be educated in that perspective. For farms. It’s, it’s been an added revenue stream, in some cases, and been a way to help maybe do some things or expand here, where they were, they might not have been able to do that. Otherwise,

Nate Disarro 31:05
when you mentioned a couple vineyards here, and one of the best examples, I think of agritourism that you don’t often think of as that is wineries. Right? Yeah. You know, all the winery is really is a great farm. Yeah. And it just it happens to make a product that people really want to go sit and enjoy and understand where it came from the stories behind the the flavor notes and get to meet the people that actually, you know, bottle that wine, and there’s a lot of interesting thing. I think, some dairy farms with cheeses are the same way. You know, wine and cheese, great pairing. But yeah, but do you think or I mean, not that you’re the expert, as you say, but, you know, using your your PR brain? Is there? Is there a way to turn more farms into those kinds of experiences?

Jason Brown 31:58
Yeah, so we’ve been working on a fun project that is focused on road safety for farm equipment, and just really helping consumers understand how farm equipment operates. And and and what it can and can’t do. A lot of people don’t understand that farm equipment doesn’t move faster and 20 miles an hour, some of it. There’s an exception to some of it, but you know, or, you know, they don’t always have blinkers, you know, things like that. In Northwest Arkansas, we’ve gotten that we’ve gotten that community engaged some and they say, Yeah, we love it. Let’s talk about bikes. And we’re like, oh, wow, we we’ve been thinking about cars and minivans this whole time. We didn’t really think about bikes. And you know, when you think about it, I mean, you know, a lot of these at least longer range know, I’m a river trail guy, and I’m riding seven or eight miles, and I’m out. But you know, we were with a local shift this morning. Who is okay, are we done now I want to go ride my bike I’ve got to get in 50 miles today. And he says he often rides by the farm that we were at. You know, that’s an opportunity to engage that crowd. If you’ve if you’ve ever been to me and muggy market in North Little Rock. Anytime on a Saturday morning, at any given minute, you’ll see folks in cycling get up and bicycles there at the at the market and there, they may be having breakfast, they may be doing a little shopping, whatever that may be. But they have, you know, the market when I say they has taken advantage of a captive audience, you’ve got a crew coming through on bicycles that need a break or need a bottle of water or whatever that may be. So we’ve talked about this with in Northwest Arkansas, maybe putting out some signage on your farm to educate those cyclists as they drive by, hey, maybe you’re not to the point of wanting to host to host a tour bus like P Allen doesn’t his place and rollin or whatever that may be, but maybe start by a little bit of signage, hey, on this farm, we grow XYZ, you know, and do a little bit of education just on your own property and sort of work your way there. I believe there’s some agri tourism classes that you can take that may be offered by different government departments here in the state. I certainly know there’s resources nationally. But the more that stuff that we can do, you picked we talked about you pics a lot. So I’m using a little bit of jargon but these are the imagine a bit we’ve all been to a strawberry patch at some point and picked our own strawberries and weighed them paid for them on the way out. We’ve got several those types of places here in the state. You know all of these all these places are agri tourism. And there are ways for you to get closer to the farm. Some of them are going to feel really touristy, I’m thinking of a pumpkin patch that we’ve been to several times with our daughter. You’re not going to show up at a pig farm and see pig races. That’s not going to happen. You know, some of these things are kind of glamorized for your experience. But there are opportunities to have a more realistic more real deal. Ag experience out there, and you should take advantage of those. Yeah.

Nate Disarro 35:26
Yeah, I think we’ve all been to pumpkin patches. We’ve all been to, you know, pick our own strawberries. But there’s so many other ways it seems like that, you know, and hopefully it continues to advance as broadband advances as technology advances, more ways that city people can interact with and have a good time. Out on the farm.

Jason Brown 35:47
Yeah, farmers till they’re good storytellers. Like, I’ve never never met a farmer, you know, who didn’t want to share about their operation while they make the decisions they make. And things like, and especially my gosh, if kids are involved, I’ve taken my kiddo on more farms. And I’m, you know, I’m always like, Is this the time that I get called into HR and like, don’t, you know, but, but it’s because I want her to be exposed to that. And every time they’re, like, forget, I’m even there. And they’re taking her and showing her a farmer like, to to selfie a couple months ago. And he’s like, Okay, now you got to come back and see how tall you are, how tall these beans are when you come back, you know, but, you know, ask SAPA farmer and ask them like, what do you what are you harvesting? What’s, you know, what’s your process, you know, teach me something, you know, and just kind of take that as an opportunity. I mean, be respectful of their land and, and things like that. But, you know, if you’re, I see a lot of fall family photo shoots, and in a field, you know, ask that photographer, hey, do you know the farmer, after we get into photo shoot, can? Are they going to be there? Can we talk to them, you know, take advantage of these moments where you’re in front of a farmer and ask them, ask your school’s teacher, you know, hey, can we get a? Can we get a, you know, do you have a farmer who can fill me up for career day, every school? I think, as an Arkansas week, you know, that’s a great opportunity to do something like that. If you don’t, no one, call us will call me. I’d be happy to help you. Get a farmer to your school and talk, talk to those kids. They’re happy to share. And that’s what agri tourism. I know I kind of went off on a rant a little bit, but that’s what agri tourism, tourism is all about, is bringing that connection back to us who don’t ever get to visit a farm or be on a farm anymore, like our grandparents or great grandparents used to

Nate Disarro 37:51
be? Well, you know, I’ll go back to wineries because clearly I’m well versed in that. Well, I was fortunate enough to go to Italy earlier this year and went to a winery in Tuscany, you know, get to go experience that whole thing. And what happens when you do that is you hold that product in a higher regard. You know, a little more about it. Yeah, it’s it’s ironically, it’s the more special wine even if it wasn’t the most expensive, right? Yeah. Because now you know something about it. So you want to go tell other people about it. And you want to kind of feel like, you know, something that they don’t? Yeah, I think we want that with everything in life, right? whether we’ve been to Disney World, and we want to tell our friends about the coolest thing apart about Disney World, because they haven’t been there. Yeah, or whatever. If it’s a story of, you know, crop from a farm like, yeah, once we get that experience, we want to share it with other people. And I think there’s there’s incredible value to that. And I think if we can capitalize on it, and continue to grow that sector, I think it only benefits farmers, they can do more, if they’re getting different sources of revenue and everything else I do want to jump into because this is another important thing. I think about the industry. The business of farming is a really unique business. It’s one of the only ones I think that farmers pay retail and sell wholesale, is that

Jason Brown 39:15
right? Yeah, they buy retail and sells wholesale.

Nate Disarro 39:19
Yeah. And and, and they’re not guaranteed based on their input, x number of output. You know, when airline fills up an airplane, they know exactly how much money they’re gonna make on that flight because they got X number of people that X number of dollars, and that’s not going to change. Farmers, on the other hand, could be a bad store. You know, I mean, it’s a weird business. When you look at it from a business model. It’s typically not a business model. People would be like, Yeah, I’ll get into that business.

Jason Brown 39:48
Well in row crop, you take the thing about row crop and specifically, you’re borrowing money at the beginning of the year to operate and then you owe that money. money to somebody whether or not your crop worked out or not, you still owe that money to somebody. So it’s it really is a fascinating business. I think I said that before you finish your question. But

Nate Disarro 40:11
no, I’m just curious. I mean, you know, do we see the same business models business practices is, are there shifts in those that allow farmers more leniency if something goes wrong? Or is the technology allowing for for better business practices to exist? Yeah, so

Jason Brown 40:27
technology is playing a role on this, you know, you know, we, when I was talking earlier about things like, you know, soil moisture sensors, I’ll pick on those things again, which are really just fancy looking PVC pipes that go on the ground and having a tunnel on them to communicate back to your phone or, or something, you know, those types of things are helping on the money that it takes. So if I can water less, then if I come up on a two month drought, like we had in the state of Arkansas, and I haven’t spent as much on, on watering my crop, then maybe I’ll be doing okay, you know, I might, I might be a little bit better off. Or if I can leave, if I can plant a cover crop in to help my ground absorb more water every time it rains than it used to, then that’s less money I have to put out. So when those adverse conditions, weather and bugs, I guess, would be what I would call the two most notable pressures a crop can face when those things come along, I’m better prepared. We do things like crop rotation. So we don’t grow corn every year on this same field, we rotate it out with other crops. That way, when bugs come along, or fungus in the soil or something like that, it’s better suited to fight to fight that that pressure technology helps us identify those problems earlier, helps eliminate them more efficiently. And, and do so across the large landscape that that is a farm, you know, you know, I’m talking about mostly commercial production. But you could apply this to even a backyard, you know, farm in some cases or backyard garden rather. Yeah.

Nate Disarro 42:23
Something else you brought up earlier, you said the word and my ears instantly perk up. But you mentioned that every farmer you’ve ever met is a good storyteller. And, you know, the business we’re in. We love to tell good stories, and we love to hear good stories. And when I think of farmer almost every single time, go to the Paul Harvey sermon. Yeah, Dodge Ram, commercial Ram trucks. And that he just perfectly lays out who the farmers are.

Jason Brown 42:57
Every So, farmer, if you’re, if you’re listening, and you’re not familiar with this, you can go to YouTube, probably in search. So God made a farmer.

Nate Disarro 43:05
Yeah. Well, I mean, it was a Superbowl commercial dodge Mayor remitted a Superbowl commercial several years ago. And I think it took the show. I mean, yeah, I don’t think there was a better one out there. But it painted the picture of who, you know, I mean, this sermon, I don’t know how old it is that Paul Harvey gave, but it’s an old sermon, but it’s still the way that it’s told the pictures they use just the storytelling was was phenomenal. But your job of telling the farmer story looks a little different. Yeah, day to day, right. What are some of the ways the mechanisms that you use to get the word out there? You know, yeah, tell those stories.

Jason Brown 43:46
Communicating farmer stories, you know, can be done in a lot of ways and for a lot of reasons, too, for that matter. But, you know, I’m thinking about the drought that we experienced in June and July. It was really extreme for all aspects of agriculture in the state of Arkansas. But especially on our cattle industry. What did they do when those pastures dried up they started getting into their winter hay reserves the the hay that they had grown for winter, started feeding that because there was no food out in the pasture. Hay usually comes in walk in and three cuttings, sometimes two cuttings a year, farmers had gotten through one cutting on when we got into that drought. So now you’ve got a scenario where there’s no food on the ground to eat. We’ve got to food feed the food that we’ve already stocked up for winter, and we can’t make more food for winter to replace what we’re using. So and we were on the brink of a rain, a weakened rain, the first rain we got a few weeks ago. So why is that story important to tell we asked our economist to go out and I start to quantify the damage and explain that a little bit. So we told that story. And we told that story in a couple of ways. Number one, we we, we, we shared some of that information in our podcast, the Arkansas guest. And then we started getting calls from new stations in town saying, Hey, we’ve got some drought. And one reporter specifically called and said, Oh, nevermind, it’s going to rain this weekend, I said, Whoa, don’t hang up, don’t hang up. Let me let me share something with you. And I started to explain this, why rain this weekend, doesn’t doesn’t matter to cattle farmers, because they’ve done the damage for January, February, March. And beyond. Once you sell cattle off, it’s really you’ve either got to birth them or bond. That’s it. And when you sell them, you’re not getting nearly the profit, because those people have got to feed them, you know. So it takes a long time to recover from an event like we experienced this summer. And in some cases, the USDA just added four more counties to our disaster declaration last week. So in some cases, we’re still growing in that in that damage. But we need to tell that story to consumers. High beef prices maybe a little bit higher, here’s why. But we need to tell that story to lawmakers and legislators, people who can make the decisions, to provide some assistance to get some help back in the hands of our farmers and ranchers. So that number one, there’s beef on the, um, I don’t mean to create pandemonium, it’s all going to be okay. But that way producers can continue to put that protein on the shelf, and do it in a way that is still cost effective or cost efficient for us. So we’ve got one story to tell, rain doesn’t fix a two month drought. But we’ve got to tell that story in different ways. So in you know, in one case, with the with the podcast, that’s me and my co host, reading that news and getting giving a little bit of context. When the television station showed up, we put an economist out there to explain this, when you’re talking to a legislator, let’s get let’s see if we can get a farmer or rancher there to tell that story and or invite that legislator out to their farm or ranch to see the actual impacts of that. So you can see one one story to tell. And in that example, one story to tell has a different message for different audiences and a different purpose. And we use different channels to tell those those stories.

Nate Disarro 47:44
Well, I think that hits the nail on the head. Because, you know, we talked to people all the time about how, you know, oftentimes they think they have one story to tell, really, the story the rain doesn’t fix a two month drought. That seems like one story, but there’s so many different ways and angles and and stakeholders that need to hear that story that you have to do it different ways. Yeah, you can’t just focus on one method one dark one, whatever you want to call it, and hope that that solves your problem. And you know, you mentioned it from a, you know, the USDA ads for counties will some people hear panic, or pandemonium or the government stepping in order to disaster, whatever, just like, you know, when the pandemic first hit, and airlines and hotels are getting, you know, bailouts or whatever, you know, yeah, everybody just hears that piece of the story. They don’t understand the why behind. They don’t understand you got to keep these industries afloat, or else it’s bad for everybody. Yeah. And you know, so I think you guys telling your own story, instead of just letting people hear one piece of something from, you know, without context or disconnecting. Connecting the Dots, certainly adds chaos. But that’s why you have a job, right?

Jason Brown 49:01
And in different ways, like with this story, you notice I told you that entire sort of story about the drought impact, and I didn’t use a single dollar figure. Now the report, my economists are probably texting me right now because the report quantified that impacted $95 million for Arkansas cattle producers that that two months of drought. But here’s the thing is like there’s I’ve got a we’ve got a three or four page report on our website full of data and tables and things like that. At the end of the day, that’s not meant for everybody, I can’t go stick that one report into every person that we can see from our seats right now and expect them to care about it in the same way. So understanding who Who are you talking to what is the most important thing to them and then saying that thing to them is is effective communications and what Not say, thoughtful communications. And that’s how you make storytelling productive.

Nate Disarro 50:05
Which is ultimately the point. I mean, we do it with a purpose, you know, unless we’re gonna go write books and sell them.

Jason Brown 50:12
I don’t know. Fine Art. So you know?

Nate Disarro 50:16
Well, so let’s, let’s peel back the curtain a little bit, figure out a little bit more about who you are. We’ll do a few quick hit questions and wrap things up. Yeah. So first and foremost, are you Netflix guy or news guy?

Jason Brown 50:32
Probably a news guy, I check. A check than the news have a ridiculous amount of news subscriptions.

Nate Disarro 50:40
Alright, so what’s your favorite book or the current book you’re reading?

Jason Brown 50:44
Yeah, sure. So the the book I’m reading right now is pretty fun. It’s called What If, and the author was a little rocket scientist. He was a contractor for NASA. And kind of as a side hustles, a lot of us have side hustles. These days, he had an internet cartoon, that he that he created on a pretty regular basis. And I guess on this, on this website, he had just an open forum for questions for people to ask questions. And so he began to feel like all these ridiculous questions that had nothing to do with this cartoon, which is like why qcb I think, is that I’m a cartoon anyhow. So he wrote a book where he gives the question, he restates the question and the person who asked it, and he gives the answer to this question, based on physics and science, so it’s things like, what if I started, what if my body started floating upwards in the air 10 seconds, or 10 feet every minute, I think, what would happen and he like, goes into a whole scenario and like, you’d be okay, until you got to this elevation, and then you’d probably need a jacket. And it just really fun. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s learning science and in a pretty entertaining way. And he’s got a great sense of humor. And I think he’s written at least one follow up, if not two follow ups now, but I’m still in the first one. And it’s, it’s pretty fun.

Nate Disarro 52:17
Nice. I’m gonna have to check that one out. What if, what, alright, what’s the best piece of advice you’ve either given or received

Jason Brown 52:24
never present a problem without a solution. We all like to talk about our problems. To a point sometimes of comedy, you know, we joke about first world problems and things like this. But you know, we’re all really quick to talk about the things that are bugging us and given us issues. You know, especially in a professional setting, if you can always make it a goal, to never introduce a problem without introducing a solution to that problem. I promise you people will notice, this advice was given to me really early on in my career. And it took me a long time to really understand it. And, honestly, it’s the gift that keeps on giving, like, the more I think about it, the more meaningful it is to me, and we’ve we applied at home, we’ve raised our daughter, hey, don’t come in here and tell something’s wrong, unless he can tell us, you know, give us an idea what we need to do to fix it. It really is, and people will understand people will not see you as the person who complains or just those the red flag, you know, we’re in a time of, of issue or time of trial, you start to be seen as the problem solver or the the solutions oriented team member and things like this. So that’s it,

Nate Disarro 53:45
because it’s the absolute truth. Nobody wants to live in a world of problems. But we want to live in a world of problem solvers.

Jason Brown 53:53
And we all have something to gripe about, look, at the end of the day. I can I can gripe about to you about three things that happened today. And that’s an important thing to process. I say that for a beer or something like, You know what I mean, do that over a beer and just kind of gripe and moan. But if you’re really if you’re stepping into say, Hey, we’ve been losing website traffic for the past three months, don’t put a period on the end of that statement, say, I suggest we do a content audit of the traffic that’s driving, what the content is driving traffic to our website, or some have that other part. And that might not be the solution that we end up with. And don’t get your feelings hurt if that’s the case. But you’re being proactive in in draw, and you may be a leader in that conversation that somebody says Well, I don’t know if we should look at the content. But what if we did this? Yeah, I think that would be helpful, you know, just make yourself the solutions. person here for

Nate Disarro 54:55
it. Alright, what is the best thing you’ve bought in the last year for under $100?

Jason Brown 54:59
I have Way too many, but a reasonable water bottle, you know, the environment is a big reason why I got involved in agriculture as well because I believe in the farmers power to, to address some of the climate challenges that we have and, and you know, everywhere I go, I see water bottles, we became campers during COVID and we still continue that lifestyle. And you see a lot of water bottles showing up at campsites and things like that and and I think you know, any little bit that you can do spend 10 bucks and maybe save some money on that case of water and and just think about the decisions that you’re you’re making as you move through your day. And so there there’s I don’t know there’s there’s a little bit cheaper than 100 bucks purchase.

Nate Disarro 55:57
I love it. All right, let’s wrap it up. best meal. What’s your favorite meal? Favorite restaurant? You mentioned a chef you’re hanging out with earlier?

Jason Brown 56:06
Yeah. Yeah, that was a good one. Um, oh my gosh, if I’m eating, my wife can tell you to suffer if I’m having one meal. It’s probably shrimp and grits. And I’m a Southern, local vor to the, you know, to all ends you know, I love all things about Southern culture. And food is probably at the top of that list. And grits are something that are so subjective. We have a bakery, right? A restaurant right near our house that this weekend I had a bacon and grits quiche. So grits are sort of like, you know, the all part one of the all purpose foods and when you know, I’ve seen someone say I don’t like grits. And you give them a bite of grits. And they’re like, all right, you changed my mind. recently was at the Oyster Bar and Little Rock and had their grits and I’m telling you, man, it’s a game changer. So shrimp and grits all day every day. If it’s on the menu I’m getting.

Nate Disarro 57:14
You haven’t had him in loco Luna. Local Luna.

Jason Brown 57:17
I have had them. I’m sorry. Red Door red door. Yeah, yeah. Right across the market. There. Yeah. The other great recommendation I have for you and I don’t like just seek them out. But you know, when you have memorable ones, my mom was with me at at the corner. And she’s like, Yeah, who wants my grits? And I’m like, Just try them, you know? And she ate the entire bowl. You know? They were really good at the corner. Two sisters Canadian so Oh, really? Okay. I did not know that. Have they been on this podcast? That sisters are no no. Okay, get them on here. Yeah, you started this season with food, didn’t you? Kevin? Yes. Kevin on this

Nate Disarro 58:02
shaylen We got started with with the mighty rib and yeah, you know, and then he right after we recorded he went off and you know, made a silly little comment. In fact, I need to start adding. The first time we add this question to the quick hits. Okay, dinner or supper?

Jason Brown 58:20
Ah, Kevin would be so proud. I know, Kevin and personally, I know we would dinner all day. I tell you I’m southern to the core and all that. But it’s, it’s it’s dinner. It’s not suffer. I’ve got to ask you now. Oh, well,

Nate Disarro 58:36
my answer shall remain. No, I’m kidding. No, I’m a pretty literal person in a lot of ways. And I think supper is a slang term. That’s how I know other people will come at me with pitchforks. But yeah, I think suffer is a slang term. Yeah, in my mind. Yeah. But you know, to each their own. So, supper clubs used

Jason Brown 58:57
to be a big thing. You know, I mean, so I don’t know. But yeah, now it’s, it’s it’s dinner for me. Breakfast, lunch, dinner.

Nate Disarro 59:04
I love it. All right, Jason. Thanks, man. I really appreciate you coming and having this conversation. It was a lot of fun.

Jason Brown 59:10
Thanks for having me. So, so much fun. And yeah, best of luck with the rest of the season.

Nate Disarro 59:17
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