A message from Beth Ford:

Member-owners,
I am excited to let you all know that Pete Kappelman will be joining Land O’Lakes, Inc. as our Senior Vice President, Member and Government Relations on March 11.  I don’t have to tell all of you what a wonderful asset Pete will be for your cooperative, as you’ve seen Pete lead the Board for the last 15 years and for 23 years total as a Board member.  He knows our business and he knows all of you.
Per Pete’s wishes, he will remain focused solely on his board role until his term ends at the Annual Meeting in a few weeks, and he will assume the duties of his new role on March 11.
Pete is the perfect choice for this position based on his lifetime of experience as a successful crop and dairy farmer, his advocacy experience and his Board involvement with many agricultural organizations.  Pete has been a leader in working with legislators on important ag policy issues including Farm Bill, trade and immigration.  He’s also been called upon by media to give his perspective on these issues.  He served as an Ag Policy Advisor to the Administration for USDA and USTR and was named NCFC’s Director of the Year in 2018.  His Board service included the National Milk Producer’s Federation, the National Dairy Promotion and Research Board; the U.S. Dairy Export Council; the Professional Dairy Producers of Wisconsin, and the UW Center for Dairy Profitability.  Pete looks forward to engaging more directly with locals in his new role.
Pete is a fourth-generation farmer and is co-owner of Meadow Brook Dairy Farms, LLC., with his wife, Shellie, and their three adult children. Their operation includes 450 milking cows along with 1,100 acres of cropland. In fact, the Kappelmans were Wisconsin's 1995 Dairy Farm Family of the Year and Pete was 2018 Dairyman of the Year. Kappelman received a bachelor’s of science degree from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, College of Agriculture.  For the duration of Pete’s employment at Land O’Lakes, the management of his dairy farm will be transferred to his family.
In his new role, Pete will be responsible for leveraging Land O'Lakes resources to help members grow profitably and to strengthen our partnerships on technology, talent, branding and financial services.  Pete will have direct responsibility for the Member Relations and Government Relations teams and matrixed responsibility for the Business Development Services and the Strategic Asset Management teams.  Additionally, he will work across the enterprise to offer Land O’Lakes members value-added products and services including ACT, FLM Harvest, IT services, BuyPoint, member health care offerings, Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN and the Land O’Lakes Finance Company, among others.
We are excited to have Pete provide a single point of contact for everything we strive to deliver to our membership.