In 1980, Morris Thalen started with a share of a 200-sow farrow-to-finish farm in British Columbia near Chilliwack. One year later he got into cattle buying and selling, and seven years later, Thalen made the leap to dairy farming, milking 17 grade cows in a small barn with four stalls.
Fast forward to 2010, and the Thalens are milking 1,000 cows on their Ponoka, Alta. farm and they have just sold one cow for an incredible $1.2 million.
Eastside Lewisdale Gold Missy is the second-most expensive cow in Canadian history and one of five cows in the world to sell for over $1 million. At an auction sale just before the Royal Winter Fair in Toronto, a syndicate of buyers Gert Andreasen of Denmark, Mark Butz of Iowa, Van Ruinen Dairy of Lacombe, Alberta and Thalen s Morsan Farms bought this three-year-old Holstein. Subsequently, another member, George Uebelhart of Ponoka, Alta. has joined the syndicate, buying 10 per cent of Missy.
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A syndicate is a group of corporations or individual businesses that band together for a single enterprise, in this case getting the most out of Missy. This young cow has a huge genetic potential and has never been beaten in her class in the show ring. She produces well, was classified VG-89 at two years old, and she can produce lots of offspring. A flushing program in September yielded 19 viable eggs, where the average flush is four or five.
Missy carries a total of about $250,000 worth of embryo (fertilized egg) contracts. So far, she has also seven bull contracts to fill with her male offspring, and six of these are potentially lucrative royalty contracts, meaning the contract buyers will send royalty cheques to the syndicate of up to $500,000 when they sell semen from Missy s sons.
Thalen had purchased Missy as a bred heifer from her birthplace in Prince Edward Island as part of Morsan Farms business plan to begin marketing Canadian Holstein genetics internationally. For the past seven years, Morsan Farms has invested millions in genetics, buying and showing top show cows and heifers, developing milk records with three-times-a-day milking, investing in top sires, and using embryo transfer.
It was time to start reaping a return on investment, says Thalen. So we said, let s sell our best. She has massive earning potential.
By selling her in a syndicate, the Thalens retained a portion of her while generating cash flow. They also created a buzz around Missy s name and around Morsan Farms that will maximize more marketing oppor-
