Raw milk dairy in Fresno County resumes bottling after quarantine. Here’s what it cost
A six-week shutdown of Fresno County-based Raw Farm dairy, the state’s leading raw milk bottler, has cost the company at least $2.7 million in lost sales, founder Mark McAfee told The Bee this week.
The company’s two 900-cow dairy farms, one in Fresno County and the other in adjacent Kings County, were put under quarantine by the state after the dairies tested positive for bird flu.
The California Department of Food and Agriculture’s shutdown meant McAfee had to stop bottling his prized and profitable raw milk that retails around $16 to $18 a gallon.
McAfee said Thursday the Hanford dairy has cleared the state-mandated tests to resume milk production, while the flagship dairy in west Fresno County is in the process.
Although McAfee was able to sell his bulk milk to conventional milk processors who pasteurized it, none of it was sold as raw milk.
Kaleigh Stanziani, Raw Farm’s vice president of marketing, said the timing of the quarantine meant the company missed two of the busiest sales periods: Thanksgiving and December. Prior to the quarantine, Raw Farm was experiencing a 30% to 50% growth in monthly sales.
Raw Farm purchasing dairy in Northern California
To avoid another potential disruption in supply, McAfee made the move to purchase a third dairy north of Sacramento.
The 900-cow dairy is in an area that has not been hit by the bird flu. Statewide, more than 700 dairies, or nearly three-quarters of the industry, have had bird flu, with most of those dairies in the San Joaquin Valley.
“We wanted to be way out of the bird flu zone,” McAfee said. “So if one dairy is shut down, we will have another to continue processing.”
Raw Farms sales resume after quarantine
As news began filtering out about Raw Farm resuming production, customers began flocking to the dairy’s on-farm store on South Jameson Avenue in west Fresno County.
Jessica Rascon, an administrative assistant at Raw Farm, said the store was slammed with people wanting to get their hands on gallons and half-gallons of raw milk. The refrigerator case inside the store had to be restocked several times.
It could take several days for the milk to make it to grocery stores throughout the state. For some, that was too long of a wait.
Several customers from fire-ravaged Los Angeles County drove to the dairy’s farm store to get their supply.
“One woman told me she was getting in her Suburban, with some ice chests, and driving up here to pick up a bunch of people’s orders of milk,” Stanziani said. “It’s been non-stop at our farm store.”
Mark McAfee, raw milk and RFK Jr.
One of McAfee’s more notable customers is Robert F. Kennedy Jr., president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to be secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.
Kennedy, whose nomination has been opposed by many in the medical community for his anti-vaccine views, reached out to McAfee and asked him to be an advisor to the Food and Drug Administration on shaping raw milk policy in the United States.
McAfee said he would work with FDA regulators, despite their position that raw milk is unsafe to drink because it is not pasteurized to kill harmful bacteria.
In preparation of his role as an advisor, McAfee said RFK Jr.’s team recently asked him to develop a “deeper vision” for raw milk production in the United States.
“And,” McAfee said, “I am developing that right now.”
