Direct marketing is their path to full-time farming

When consumers recognize your brand, it’s a sure sign that you’re doing something right.

At restaurants across southern Ontario, to see the name of one particular beef operation on the menu is a testament to the hard work of Kara and Darold Enright.

“Something that we are always trying to promote to the consumers is that we’re a local, trusted brand, and so when they see Enright Cattle Company listed on the menu, we’re hoping that they choose that item,” said Kara, who farms with her husband and two young children at Tweed, Ont. “We put a lot of effort into putting our brand in front of the consumer and having them associate it with a local family farm, an Ontario brand and something that they can trust and resonate with.”

This brand recognition didn’t happen overnight. It’s the result of years of work after the Enrights decided that direct marketing was the major change their business needed.

“We were working a lot of long hours trying to build the farm, and the farm was not even breaking even, let alone making a profit,” said Kara, who worked in sales for a feed company while her husband worked as a custom home builder.

“By 2009, when we decided to start our family, we felt that we just didn’t have enough time to continue in the way we were going, and we needed to make some drastic changes so that our farm would become profitable and sustain at least one of us as a full-time employee.”

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