The Scoop - Fall 2020

FALL 2020 | VOLUME 3

STRENGTH IN DIVERSITY, UNITY IN INCLUSION

CULTURE

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GET YOUR DFA SWAG Show your DFA pride with clothing, accessories, housewares and more, all available on the DFA Store

BRAND TALK

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IGNITE YOUR HOLIDAY SEASON A new cinnamon eggnog product featuring our family farm-owners’ milk is blazing to store shelves this winter

COMMERCIAL

DFA’S FAMILY OF BRANDS PUTS FOCUS ON COMMUNITY AND FARMER OWNERSHIP How our newly acquired regional brands are repositioning for the future

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STRENGTH IN DIVERSITY,

Joanie Baucum-Robinson Continuous Improvement Director Kansas City, Kan.

Cherrese Belt Senior Human Resources Manager Dallas, Texas

Lee Dean Senior Corporate Benefits Administrator Kansas City, Kan.

Ricardo Deleo Plant Manager Dalbo, Minn.

Shirill Donato Administrative Assistant, Dairy Brands Rensselaer, N.Y.

Edward Gallagher President, DFA Risk Management Syracuse, N.Y.

George Kelley Council Chair Senior Director, Order Fulfillment Kansas City, Kan.

Jackie Larkins Business Services Director Minneapolis, Minn.

JeVel Lindon Human Resources Generalist Kansas City, Kan.

Miguel Lopez Purchasing Specialist St. Albans, Vt.

Armando Martinez Production Supervisor Goshen, Ind.

A diverse and inclusive workspace for our nearly 20,000 employees is essential to living our values of integrity, passion, quality and community.

With ongoing social unrest in our country amid a pandemic, there is no better time to bring employees together from across the Cooperative to assess where we’ve been, where we are and where we need to be in terms of diversity and inclusion.

This fall, 22 employees are pioneering DFA’s inaugural Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Council. The group is comprised of employees from across the Cooperative who have been nominated or have volunteered and will meet regularly for the foreseeable future. With vast diversity in race, age, gender, sexual orientation, job role, location and experience, the council will represent and reflect the experiences, ideas and needs of all employees.

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thescoop | Fall 2020

As the inaugural group, the council is tasked with helping to develop, implement and communicate a diversity and inclusion strategy for DFA, as well as advising senior leadership on DFA’s diversity and inclusion needs.

The council met for the first time Monday, Aug. 31, hearing from President and Chief Executive Officer Rick Smith and Executive Vice President and Chief of Staff Monica Massey, who serves as executive sponsor of the council.

“We know the agricultural community, and specifically DFA, can be a stronger, better organization with diversity,” Rick said during the meeting. “I think along the way, along with everything else we need to do, we’re going to ask DFA to change. And that’s going to take education, communication, tolerance and respect.”

UNITY IN INCLUSION

Victor Gastelum General Manager, Dairy Brands City of Industry, Calif.

Eileen Gress Field Representative Medina, Ohio

Johnny Hiramoto Director, Accounting and Analysis Corona, Calif.

Darryl Hood Corporate Sanitation Manager Kansas City, Kan.

Anna Ivanova Lab Manager Salt Lake City, Utah

Mark Niermann Vice President and Chief Counsel Dallas, Texas

Philip Salazar Regional Continuous Improvement Manager Portales, N.M.

Dorcas Siryowe Supervisor, Quality Assurance Mechanicsburg, Pa.

Wayne Swearingen Director, Operations Kansas City, Kan.

Jackie Vavroch Assistant Vice President, Legal Kansas City, Kan.

During the meeting, all 22 employees on the council introduced themselves, sharing brief stories and reasons why investing in diversity and inclusion is important to them.

“Looking at today’s world, you can’t be complacent anymore. I have three kids, and I think about what kind of world I want them to grow up in as minorities,” shared Philip Salazar, regional continuous improvement manager in Portales, N.M. “I want to make sure, with what I can control and what I can be involved in, that I do what I can to improve their futures and their opportunities to be included.”

The individuals on the council are excited for the future. For many, the opportunity to discuss diversity and inclusion at DFA is a conversation they are passionate about continuing.

Joe Zhu Commodity Risk Management Analyst Kansas City, Kan.

“I heard a great analogy recently at a leadership conference. Diversity is being invited to the dance. Inclusion is being asked to dance. And belonging is dancing like no one’s watching,” says Joanie Baucum-Robinson, continuous improvement director in Kansas City, Kan. We are on the path to strengthening the welcoming community DFA is and aspires to be.

“We want all employees, whether they work in a plant, lab, the field or in an office, to feel as though being part of the DFA family means you can walk into work each day as your authentic self,” Monica says. “We know that we, as a business, can do more and be better. We must be more intentional in every aspect of our culture, which includes identifying our blind spots, educating ourselves and taking action. Our individual talents, experiences and perspectives can make us unique, and coming together to celebrate these differences can only make our Cooperative stronger.”

thescoop | Fall 2020

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INNOVATION COOPERATIVE

DFA 101: OUR GRASSROOTS GOVERNANCE As a Cooperative owned by family dairy farmers, it’s important each of their voices is heard throughout the organization. With more than 13,000 family farm-owners spread across the United States, that can be a difficult task.

To ensure our members have farmer leadership they can depend on, DFA utilizes a grassroots governance structure that represents our family farm-owners through elected farmer-leaders at all levels of the Cooperative. This grassroots governance structure allows our organization to hear from dairy farmers from all walks of life — from Lodi, Calif., to Shippensburg, Pa., and everywhere in between.

It works like this — DFA is a national milk marketing cooperative split into seven geographic Areas across the country. Those Areas are then divided into districts, where Area Council members, delegates and Resolutions Committee members are elected by other members in their district. From the Area Councils and Area Resolutions Committee, members are selected to serve at the national level, ensuring members from all Areas are represented. A 49-member Board of Directors oversees this grassroots governance structure. The Board is made up of DFA members who help guide the Cooperative by providing business direction, establishing policies and making strategic decisions for the future of the Cooperative.

MILK BAR SESSIONS COMING SOON With employees spread out at locations across the nation, it’s hard to learn what other departments, teams and your fellow co-workers are working on, or even what they do. To create more collaboration across our community of employees, CoLAB, DFA’s innovation program, is launching virtual milk bar sessions. Think of these as informal gatherings to talk about what’s going on at DFA — just as though you were hanging out at a bar, a milk bar of course. Before you grab a cold glass of the good stuff, these sessions are coming soon. Look for more information in the coming weeks.

Since we are an organization owned by our dairy farmers, it’s imperative that we are also led by the same dairy farmers. This structure that relies on farmer leadership helps us accomplish this and ensures our family farm-owners are guiding the Cooperative now and into the next generation.

Our members constantly overcome obstacles on their operations and within their communities that require different responses and tactics based on where they live and the situation at hand. Our governance structure allows our Cooperative to fit the needs of each of our dairy farmers for any given situation based on their location and Area-specific needs. With different weather patterns, supply and demand situations and more, each of our seven Areas is tasked with addressing local and regional issues for their members and laddering up to our vision of enriching communities and consumers’ lives through all the possibilities of dairy.

DFA members work tirelessly to bring all the possibilities of dairy to life and it is our duty as employees to support them with services and investments that help maintain a strong, sustainable and dependable Cooperative. At DFA, we are here to help our members succeed and our grassroots governance helps to ensure we can do exactly that.

But our governance structure isn’t stagnant. Just as our industry evolves, we also adjust our governance structure occasionally to fit the changing times, such as altering the number of delegates, adjusting the size of the Board and fine-tuning the responsibility of the governance bodies — all while ensuring our family farm-owners come first.

CULTURE

GET YOUR DFA SWAG At DFA, our logo stands for all the things that matter to us, which is why we’re proud to display it on everything — from shirts to caps to office supplies. Show your DFA pride with clothing, accessories, housewares and more, all available on the DFA Store at store.dfamilk.com.

Stock up on some cozy essentials to get ready for cooler weather or cute clothes for the kiddos.

Whatever you need, we’ve got you covered.

Take advantage of free ground shipping now through Nov. 15.

Just enter DFAGRND at check out.

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thescoop | Fall 2020

BRAND TALK

COMMERCIAL

IGNITE YOUR HOLIDAY SEASON

THE CREAMERY RECOGNIZED AMONG TRIPADVISOR’S TOP 10% OF ATTRACTIONS WORLDWIDE

Fall is in full swing, and our favorite flavors are hitting store shelves. But if you’re already thinking about the holidays, we have you covered with something new in the dairy case — made with milk from our family farm-owners: Fireball® Cinnamon Holiday Nog. No, there’s no alcohol in it; instead it’s infused with the popular Fireball cinnamon flavor mixed in with our rich and creamy whole milk.

The idea was sparked during a holiday beverage brainstorm with marketing team members from the DFA Dairy Brands Division. The group was looking at opportunities to create excitement in the dairy case for the important holiday shopping period coming up. During the discussion, Ashley Martin, sales and marketing specialist at Oakhurst Dairy, suggested a Fireball cinnamon flavored eggnog.

According to Bangor Daily News, in 2019, Fireball surpassed Allen’s Coffee Flavored Brandy as Maine’s top-selling liquor, with Fireball Cinnamon Whisky now being the most lucrative brand of booze in Maine, where Oakhurst Dairy is located. “Fireball is the fastest growing liquor brand in America, and it made sense to try to leverage this unique cinnamon flavor,” Ashley says.

You may be familiar with traditional eggnog, made with eggs. This product does not contain any eggs and is aimed at younger, millennial consumers. “We wanted to contemporize the eggnog category and deliver a new product that would attract younger consumers,” Ashley says. Because of the great collaboration efforts across the business, the team was quickly able to get the product to market. With discussions beginning in February, it only took six months to get it on shelves. The Kemps® marketing and research and development (R&D) teams worked closely with Cumberland Dairy to develop and commercialize the product.

The team also locked down a partnership with Walmart this year to sell the cinnamon nog in 2,500 stores across the U.S, with plans to expand to other retailers in 2021. “There’s a lot of buzz with this launch at the leadership level at Walmart,” Dustin says. “We are expecting this to be a very successful program and I think this partnership with this exclusive launch can lead to more opportunity in the future.”

With distribution happening nationwide, the team is working with Stremick’s Heritage Foods™ and Cumberland Dairy to assist in production efforts. These facilities are a part of our extended shelf life network, meaning they produce products that are safe to stay on shelves for a longer period of time. This new beverage will have an extended shelf life of more than 60 days, allowing us to ship across the nation and still maintain its fresh, pure taste.

Be sure to stop by your local Walmart between October and December to pick up a carton, or two, and help support our family farm-owners across the Cooperative.

Visitors from far and wide have spoken and they love The Creamery, our retail store in Beaver, Utah.

The Creamery was recently recognized as a Tripadvisor Travelers’ Choice Award winner. This year, the platform combed through a full year of reviews and ratings, prior to any changes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, to determine the top 10% of attractions worldwide.

A recent review called The Creamery “a true little gem,” while another titled their review, “Beautiful building, friendly people, delicious dairy.”

“The Creamery is a dairy destination with a story to tell,” says Dennis Rodenbaugh, executive vice president and president of council operations and ingredients. “We’re thrilled that story is resonating with visitors who come into the store. This award is a true testament to the high quality of the milk our family farm-owners produce, the dedication of our production crew and the outstanding experience our staff provides every guest that comes through our door.”

Every purchase at The Creamery supports DFA’s family farm-owners.

The milk used to make the delicious dairy products sold at the store is processed at the DFA plant right next door. Learn more about the store at thecreameryutah.com.

thescoop | Fall 2020

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COMMERCIAL

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

DFA’S FAMILY OF BRANDS PUTS FOCUS ON COMMUNITY AND FARMER OWNERSHIP

LEARNING HOW TO STAY SAFE ONLINE

Beloved regional brands have been a part of the DFA family for years. They support our mission to deliver value to our family farm-owners by providing consumers with the dairy they crave — from the brands they love.

October is here, and that means we are busy celebrating National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, a month dedicated to raising awareness around cybersecurity.

With the acquisition of a substantial portion of Dean Foods’ assets earlier this year, we added nearly twice the number of brands to our family, including regional fluid milk and ice cream businesses with leading brands supported by strong customer and consumer relationships.

To help us learn more, the information security team within the Information Technology (IT) Department has been sharing tips on how to stay safe online this October.

In order to support continued growth, it was important to reposition the brands both within the marketplace and in a world that looked completely different due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It was time to start telling the individual brand stories, while also adding the new benefit of having the farmer ownership of DFA,” says Sharon Springborn, senior director of marketing.

Making a change To put that idea into action, DFA Dairy Brands formed a regional brand project team to develop a plan to shift away from Dean Foods’ national brand and create an all-in strategy to support our regional brands. This included removing the national brand, DairyPure, from packaging and refocusing efforts on building our regional brands.

More and more people are interested in where their food comes from today, and this number is only increasing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. For the first time in 20 years, Gallup® poll tracking Americans’ views of businesses and industries, put farming and agriculture at the top of the list. The poll was released in September.

“Consumers are also motivated to support family farms,” Sharon says. “They’re interested in freshness, taste and supporting the community, making the strong heritage of the former Dean Foods’ brands and their connection to consumers in their communities uniquely positioned to deliver on this growing opportunity.”

Farmer owned. Community loved.

The team has already begun a massive initiative to design and roll out new packaging designs for 17 regional brands with the overarching positioning of: Farmer owned. Community loved. “Our regional brands have been providing families with delicious, fresh dairy since the early 1900s,” Sharon says. “From humble beginnings, they have grown to be favorite brands within the communities they serve. Additionally, with the acquisition by DFA, we are able to offer consumers the added benefit of farmer-ownership, which tells consumers they are getting the freshest and highest-quality dairy.”

Consumers will see the new branding on store shelves beginning in mid-October, with additional brands added throughout 2021. Beyond packaging, consumers can connect with the brands through social media and the brands’ websites.

“None of this would be possible without a team that includes a leadership group of executive sponsors and a steering committee, and an on-the-ground working team that includes departments and individuals across the organization,” Sharon says.

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thescoop | Fall 2020

“Since we’re all online in today’s world, it’s important that we understand various cybersecurity threats, how to recognize them and how to respond to them,” says Sherry Callahan, chief information security officer. “To help keep ourselves and our families safe, DFA celebrates National Cybersecurity Awareness Month each October with different topics to ensure our employees know how to protect themselves online, whether that’s while they are at work or at home.”

Sherry leads the information security team. The team is responsible for preventing and monitoring cyberattacks and responding to attacks if needed. Additionally, they ensure all employees have access to the programs and software to do their jobs — and stay safe online.

Sherry says the number one thing we can do to protect ourselves online is to create strong passwords. She shares a few tips: Don’t use the same password on multiple websites; you should use a different password for each site. As well, password management software can help you keep track of your passwords. In addition to creating strong passwords, Sherry says it’s also important to set up multifactor authentication for your accounts.

“Multifactor authentication is when you enter a number that is texted to you or sent to you via email to confirm your identity when logging in,” she says.

“Ultimately, cybersecurity is important because the decisions you make could impact DFA through a cyberattack, or at home through identity theft,” Sherry says. “There are some big implications that could come from things that feel like very small decisions.”

Watch for our communications throughout the month with more tips for staying safe online.

HUMAN RESOURCES

TALENT ACQUISITION TEAM LEANS ON VIRTUAL RECRUITING DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC Across the Cooperative, teams continue to make adjustments, overcome challenges and find the positives during the COVID-19 pandemic.

For the talent acquisition team, which is a part of the Human Resources (HR) Department, navigating little-to-no in-person recruiting, interviewing and onboarding has been a big obstacle for a team primarily focused on building relationships. Through it all, they’ve found ways to not only keep up, but get better at what they do.

The talent acquisition team, based at the Kansas City, Kan., office, finds talented individuals in the market and helps them find the right career opportunities at DFA to achieve their own professional goals and fill organizational needs. The headquarters team primarily assists in recruiting exempt-level (or think of it as salaried employees) throughout DFA and hourly employees in Kansas City.

As well, the team supports DFA’s other HR professionals who are recruiting at their locations. “Whether they’re in a plant or an Area office or the Kemps® office for example, we offer support and use the same tools and resources for recruiting hourly paid individuals across the organization,” says Kyle Wright, director of talent acquisition.

At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the talent acquisition team came up against an unexpected challenge. “Initially, we thought we’d see an increased talent pool because other organizations not as fortunate as DFA were laying off individuals,” Kyle says. “That did not end up exactly how it played out.”

“Instead, it turned out people felt they had more flexibility and time to look for employment due to strong unemployment benefits,” Kyle says. “As well, during a pandemic, people don’t necessarily want to get out and do in-person interviews. So, we did not see a huge influx of candidates applying towards our opportunities, which made it an increased challenge for us to be able to find people and fill some of those opportunities we had available.”

“Take a maintenance manager candidate, for example, who would want to see the equipment and the production environment and what the expectation will be for them,” Kyle says. “If travel wasn’t possible, we’d still want to make sure we’re getting people a visual of what the plant environment is like, even if they’re not able to be there in person quite yet.”

And that’s just the interview. Once candidates are hired into offices that remain working remotely, it’s a whole different experience having never met your hiring manager or co-workers in person. The talent acquisition team was concerned about ensuring new hires working remotely felt connected to the culture of DFA. “It’s definitely been a bit different, but we have cross-functional teams working to make sure the new hire is getting comfortable, trained, learning their team and being able to build those relationships,” Kyle says.

Beyond hiring and onboarding, the team has recently started participating in virtual job fairs and recruiting at colleges for entry-level and internship positions. Despite looking different, Kyle says she hopes virtual career fairs continue as an option in the future along with in-person events. Rather than spending time explaining who DFA is and what we do, the virtual option allows for dedicated time with students who have already researched DFA and the conversation can focus on opportunities we have that might match with their interests.

Despite challenges, Kyle focuses on the positives. “This really forced us to look at attracting and engaging talent differently and see how we can problem-solve and still get the same results, even if we have to get to it from a different path,” she says. “At the time it’s painful, but when you look back on it there is a lot to be proud of.”

The team pivoted by bulking up the tools and resources used to assist in finding candidates, launching brainstorming sessions to share what’s working and what’s not among co-workers and adjusting processes, such as how they interview candidates.

“While previously some of our hiring managers were interested in doing video interviewing, it wasn’t universal. It wasn’t a given step in the process.

And, now, it is,” Kyle says. The talent acquisition team currently completes as much of the recruiting process as possible virtually, which means phone calls, video conferencing and even virtual plant tours.

Due to travel restrictions and the fact that many candidates applying for positions at our manufacturing facilities weren’t local to the area, our plants embraced live virtual tours or recorded tours when needed.

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EMPLOYEE SPOTLIGHT

MARTINA OLVERA Martina Olvera, packer operator at our La Vaquita® plant in Houston, Texas, celebrated 40 years with DFA in September. Read her Q&A below to find out how she got her start and what she’s learned at DFA over the last four decades.

Q: Tell us a little about yourself.

A: I was born in Ciudad Valles, San Luis Potosí, Mexico. I have three sisters who live in Dallas, Arkansas and Houston, one son and two grandboys, ages 16 and 10. Some of my interests include cycling and football.

Q: What did you do before you worked for DFA? A: When I was 13, I worked at a stand after school helping make gorditas, a pastry made with masa and stuffed with cheese, meat and other fillings.

Later, I moved to Houston with my family.

Q: When did you start working for DFA and what was your job when you first started?

A: I started working for DFA 40 years ago on Sept. 1, 1980. At the time, there were only five employees at the plant (formerly known as Castro Cheese that owned the La Vaquita cheese brand), so I did all jobs — manually crafting handmade cheese, wrapping the cheese and labeling.

Q: How has your job changed throughout the years?

A: My job has changed a lot. Now, there are more machines and equipment and more people.

Before, everything was handmade. There is more automation now, but still a lot of manual and heavy labor.

Q: Describe an average day on the job.

A: I get here at 4:30 a.m. and set up all the equipment, check the chemicals and sanitation and fill out paperwork before employees arrive for the 5 a.m. shift. I monitor the packing of the cheese products into their boxes, and when packing is done, we make boxes for the next day’s production.

I also oversee personnel who work in packing.

Q: What do you enjoy most about working for DFA? A: I enjoy everything – I love my job. We have a good team.

Q: What is your proudest moment, or one of your favorite memories at DFA? A: Some of my favorite moments are when I meet with former co-workers who worked for Castro Cheese and know that our product is still as good as ever and recognized. I feel proud.

Q: Are there any life lessons you’ve learned throughout the years while working at DFA? A: Yes — learning to work with people who are all different.

Q: What motivates you every day?

A: My family motivates me to come to work every day and make a good living. As a single mom, I raised my son without much assistance. By my example, I give my family these same principles to live by.

Q: What’s your favorite dairy product?

A: My all-time favorite is La Vaquita Queso Fresco.

I always love it and use it on all my dishes.

dfamilk.com | © 2020 Dairy Farmers of America | October 2020

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