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- [00:03]
Weston Hendricks
Welcome to season four of Empower youw.
- [00:05]
Tyson Rule
And I'm your host, Weston Hendricks, and I developed this platform alongside my team with the objective of aiding to your interests as an individual in the livestock industry. Our goal is to empower you while gaining insights and trust and consuming it from some of the most significant people in our industry. With that said, a new episode is released every Friday with a sneak peek available on social media platforms a day prior to. So, as usual, thank you for tuning in and enjoy the episode.
- [00:32]
Weston Hendricks
Here's to empowering you. All right, we're live. This is going to be episode six of Empower your for season four. This is going to be a little different too. What I find it intriguing is we've been trying to get Mr. Tyson rule on for quite a while now, and it finally worked out and I'm grateful for that, but a little would kind of different sector of the industry. We're predominantly cattle and that's my comfort zone, but I want to branch out a little bit. Rural supplements is kind of his mojo. That's what he runs and what he does. And so I want to talk about rural supplements and how you've built that and how it's progressed over the years because it's intriguing to me, all the products that you all sell and the impact you have in this industry as a whole. But before we do that, Tyson, I'd like you to introduce yourself and so the listeners can get to know you a little bit.
- [01:27]
Tyson Rule
Yeah, you bet. Well, it's great to be on the podcast, Weston. You know, I've heard a lot about you guys and got to list a couple episodes while I'm. While I'm flying around. So I get to download it before I get up in the air and then, you know, get to hit them up while I'm on the. On the road. So it's up in the air on the roadie, the one. So it's been awesome. But no, I've been. I've been in the ag industry forever. You know, I'm now the old guy in the community, which is kind of crazy because I was, you know, I felt like just yesterday I was the young kid that everybody, you know, is, you know, trying to. Trying to break my way into the industry. And it's changed a lot since then. But, you know, family's been in the ag industry forever. I think my grandpa started, moved off the mountain in Colorado in 55 and started his first feedlot on the sheep side in a little small town called Brighton. Oh, he grew that into where they joined up with some other producers and started a packing plant actually downtown Denver and oh, the early 70s. My family actually moved into Hayward, Iowa to start a packing plant in the early 80s in Hayward, Iowa. That's how we moved out to central, you know, central, I guess the central Midwest. You know, started 4H FFA in that regard as I grew up in high school with, you know, a good ag chapter. From there we kind of, you know, you know, everything kind of morphs and you know, gets bigger and lahar's bigger, better and you know, faster. So.
- [02:46]
Weston Hendricks
Right.
- [02:46]
Tyson Rule
It's kind of fun. So you know, we today, you know, it started as a smaller lag group. Now we run about 2000 ewes. We have 15 full time employees. We run a, you know, large feed and supplement company. It's pretty wild, you know, a fairly large, you know, farming operation. We run a thousand acres, about 14,000 commercial pigs underneath our management. So we stay, we stay busy. So it's kind of fun. We've learned, you know, we learned a lot about business and you know, some diversification, you know, plans along with that and try to try to, you know, not, you know, not really just get ourselves in one, one segment of the industry and just kind of stay in that industry. We kind of try to figure out, you know, what's the, what's the best option to go from, you know, kind of a multitude of different angles.
- [03:32]
Weston Hendricks
Right? Yeah. And I guess I kind of have the same viewpoint just on the podcast basis of trying to grow and hit different types of sectors in the industry, whether it's sheep, goats, pigs, whatever. I, I think that's awesome in that mindset as well. For the record, anyone listening? Luke or Quinn is not on here today. That's all right. It's just going to be me and Tyson. But with that said, what I kind of want to start with is the story behind how you got in the sheep world. And you kind of hit on a little bit being in the feed lot, but mainly where it started, breeding the show sheep and then how that led to real supplements.
- [04:08]
Tyson Rule
Yeah, you bet. You know, four agent ffa. I started, you know, we started buying show lamps and they were bad. You know, when we bought them, we were the 200, $300 sheep that had tails and they were big hided. You know, we were, you know, we were commercial boys. So we were the ones there, you know, today the, the show jocks and you know, all the, all the, you know, we were the Freddy's. So you know, we, we got beat up on pretty Hard at county fair. And we were worried about rate of gain, and we were. We were those guys. So we started there and strategically got a little more aggressive and aggressive as we got into high school, about 95, which really dates me as being in high school. We decided to go out and buy some show use and kind of raise some of our own. That's kind of what started Rule Sheep Company at that point. We started 40 head and bought a couple bucks. We got lucky and started a relationship with a guy named J.B. massey out of Oklahoma. Roosevelt, Oklahoma, which was he. He was kind of one of the bigger swingers at that point, and he helped us get bucks lined up and helped us kind of start matching. Matching genetics up. And from that point, you know, we, you know, started kind of progressing our way into the sheep industry and into the show industry. Started to have a little bit of success, you know. You know, it wasn't an easy path. I mean, we, you know, from 95, you know, we kind of got beat up on pretty hard. We started kind of learning a lot, you know, and kind of taking our. Taking our licks and lumps. You know, we actually, you know, you know, got our first national champion against the national Western sox show in 2001. You know, I didn't have a real successful show career. You know, I think my only claim to fame, I think we won. I think I won Arizona national my senior year of high school. But I had a cousin, Amber Vaughn, that was out of Colorado, and by the time I got finished, we got to be really good feeders, and she got to kind of reap all the rewards that I got from my. My experience on. On taking those licks. So she. She got to feed one of our lambs that we raised, and that was our first national champion in 2001 in Denver.
- [06:08]
Weston Hendricks
That's awesome.
- [06:10]
Tyson Rule
From that point, I went into corporate America. I actually sold big, big fancy copiers that were anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 that, you know, a lot of people don't realize, you know, it's out there. But it was really cool for me. Today. I learned a lot about business. I mean, so that's the one thing I think that they talk about. Veterinarians know a lot about science, but they don't know how to run businesses. I think there's a lot of, you know, you know, I guess livestock producers that are probably the same way. I learned, you know, what works good in business, what didn't. Because I had to, you know, that's why I had to solve As a lot of our, you know, company's business problems and went in the front office. So it was fun for me. I spent five years in that industry, and a lot of it is just kind of running P&Ls and cash flows for customers and trying to figure out how to make their offices better and how to streamline things for them. I started missing ag, got tired of wearing a suit and tie every day also. I guess that was a lot of it. But started missing ag and started kind of figuring out a way to be more than just kind of a paycheck. And a guy was working 9 to 5 and a W2 income and a commission. It was fun because I was commission based. So the fun part about being corporate American being commission based is your aggregates of the harder you work, the more you make really paid off. It was paid dividends for me in that environment. I felt like I really had a good leg up over a lot of the kids that played, you know, played summer ball and, you know, maybe. Maybe some club sports.
- [07:27]
Weston Hendricks
Right.
- [07:28]
Tyson Rule
Was awesome. So I was able to actually save up quite a bit of money while I was doing it doing the copier world. I was able to take, you know, whenever I went back to the ag world, I was able to take a lot of that money and use it as a down payment for, you know, buying some land, which allowed me then to use that as leverage and collateral to build our sheep barns and went from, you know, kind of having 200, 300 use to growing it to 500 use to make another couple expansions to get us to a thousand to, you know, now the 2000 head that we're currently at. So.
- [08:00]
Weston Hendricks
Wow.
- [08:01]
Tyson Rule
You know, one of the. One of the big things that probably made a big, you know, big splash for us that in that entire process. In 2008, we just finished a purchase of Vince McGolden's. McGolden's used a couple of years before that. And he was actually did a really neat deal where he owner finances 400 used. He was trying to get out and I was trying to get in. And I didn't have the capital to go out and purchase that many use at that point. So he and I put together a plan where we kind of did a slow payment over four years. And as we sold land crop off, we paid him back. And it worked really, really well. And it's kind of neat to have an older sheet producer help a young kid like myself out in that regard. So it's one of those deals I'm always thankful for. But when all of a sudden you have 800 use. At this point, there was no AI in the industry. And we were trying to figure out, how do we get all these things bred? So that was kind of wild. And we started really doing a lot of research. And this was. The Internet was new, so Facebook, that was. I was new. And, you know, the World Wide Web was, you know, coming online, but it wasn't. Google wasn't big yet. So we had to do a lot of FTP searching. And we found out about it, you know, you know, artificial insemination. And there was, you know, a little bit of it happened, but it was, you know, kind of minimal results. A lot of it was, you know, frozen semen. But we started working with a guy named John Crawford out of Australia, and he was able to get us in contact with another technician out of Australia that came over. And I think in the summer, I guess that summer of 2009, we aied 400 ewes. And I think there's more used AI at our place during that week than there was probably in the rest of the country at that point. And had great success at it and then kind of got hooked. And we realized that, you know, hey, if we could breed 400, used to a couple, you know, I think we bred them to three bucks. Wow. You know, that lamb crop stole like gangbusters for us. You know, the next year we went and bred all 800 use, you know, and from that point on, it was wild. I mean, the, you know, the AI season, you know, the industry just kind of picked up in 2009, you know, 10, 11, 12, and just took off. I mean, right. I think. I think Tad Thompson came back from Australia in town in 2012, and a couple years later, and that's when RSG form, you know, formed, formed their operation. And it's kind of neat because, you know, we kind of were, you know, we're about year three or four when they came in, and the. Between the two of us, man, it's just. It's changed the entire way the sheep industry has been taking, you know, you know, it's taking place now. So, you know, I think whenever I look back at our business model of how we're going to progress and where we're at today. I mean, it's. It's. It's had a lot of changes and tweaks to it to get to where it's at. But the. The fact that, you know, cattle guys and pig guys are doing AI work and, you know, in the early 2000s, and you know, there's none done in the sheep world. And now I would say 90% of the sheep in the, you know, in the show ring right now are being, you know, sired by AI Bucks. You know, is kind of crazy that's happened just that fast, you know, know, probably in a 15 year period.
- [10:40]
Weston Hendricks
Right? Yeah. So you mentioned, you know, you only AI did three of those bucks. I want to talk to you about the sheep genetics, how they've gotten more and more advanced each year since then. When you talked about and from that time, real Sheep company, I guess what changes were the good and the bad. How did you resolve the issues and what pushed y' all to progress further? What genetics did you look for?
- [11:06]
Tyson Rule
You know, well, it's, it's wild. Like, you know, I would say, you know, in 2009, the, the genetic pool was diverse. I mean, you know, there was, everybody was doing their own thing. There was a ton of different genetic lines you could go to, to kind of pick from. Along with that there was really very limit, you know, limited consistency. You know, there was, you know, there was every scan, you know, there was wild exotic ones, there was thick, hampy, dumpy ones. And we kind of lined up with some Elliot genetics at that point. And two of the three rams that we bred to her, Elliot, the other one was kind of a home, you know, kind of a home raised, Johnson bred, you know, Johnson bred line. From that point, we kind of did a lot of inbreed, you know, kind of inbreeding on those two, you know, lines across those two back and forth. So we were, you know, we were, we did a neat job of kind of crossing our lines back and forth. We talk about things that worked good and didn't work good. You know, we. In 2012, Brian Johnson tried to sell three rams online named Trailblazer, Game Changer and maybe Mud Cat. That was, that was new for the sheep world. Me and those bucks brought $75,000, $74,000, maybe $30,000. And I contended two of them didn't get either any of those bought on the high end ones. And that was, you know, that was gonna be my kind of big push on those deals. I love those rams. I thought they were, you know, crazy and didn't get them bought. Well, I had another buck from actually a family friend, a long time friend, Logan McLennan in Colorado, the Buckland named Byrne. And instead I called him up the next day and said, hey, I didn't get these deals bought, you know, you know, would you price this would you price this guy to me. And he said, well, you spent, you know, you're bidding 75,000 on that deal. I mean, for all of them, you know, my buck's worth 40 for, you know, is at least worth 80,000. He's better than those guys were. I'll sell you half for 40, which at that point was a ton of money. And. But, you know, we went forward with that ram, and I'd say, if you look back at the sheep industry at this point, I'd say maybe 95% plus would be good. Go back to Burn at this point. So.
- [12:59]
Weston Hendricks
Wow.
- [12:59]
Tyson Rule
It was one of those crazy points where if I would have bid one more time or would have got one of the Johnson bucks, I probably would never would have had burn. And so the genetic pool would have, you know, not been, you know, in my favor on that side. So.
- [13:10]
Weston Hendricks
Right. You know, that's good. That's awesome. And it's like we did a episode with Willie Weiss, and it released this last Friday. And what I thought was very cool is how he described taking risks. It was a YouTube video called Burn the Boats. I don't know if you've seen it or not. It was. I got to listen to it. It made me want to just go buy an $80,000 cow and not look back, but I can't do that, so. But that's cool. I like the way that you decide to take a step and go out and buy Burnin. Since then, Burnin genetics, how have they evolved and what do they look like now? What is there anything that's burning specifically made you to now that has helped you and in the show ring as well.
- [13:58]
Tyson Rule
You bet. So, you know, so our genetics, it's kind of been a kind of a four year and then an outcross, a four year, then outcross kind of run. So we use burn. From 2012 through 2015, 16, we raised a buck called Drop the mic out of, you know, a grandson of Burn. At that point, you know, dropped the MIC, ran from 2016 through 2020. For us, he was man of the Year three years in a row. Wow. He raised the buck Lama in Oklahoma at the Allen Newcombe Ranch. That was called Unicorn. We bred in, you know, we were able to, you know, you know, get to get the breed to him. So we use him hard from 2020 through 2022 got sons out of him. Mr. Majestic was one that, you know, the goat were two that we use hard on that side, they raised our buck call break the Internet, which was our high seller that would have hit back in 21. And from there, you know, we've just kind of pushed again. You know, we, you know, it was kind of a wild run of, you know, just line breeding, you know, kind of bringing some females in, line breeding, bringing a couple females in, getting a little bit of an outcross, but you know, in theory just kind of trying to find those elite females that were, know, high end, you know, show, show animals and taking those to our bucks that we thought were the best in the, you know, best in the, you know, best in the business, best in the country we could breed to. Right. We kind of saw, I guess in 21, 22, we kind of saw the industry changing a little bit where, you know, there was a little bit of a transition where there was a little bit more of an up and outlook that was kind of coming into the play. And I didn't really have anything that I thought kind of fit that mold. We went and outcrossed in 20, 22 to a buck called how high. And it was, it was a little, you know, it was the, the risk factor they talk about. You know, we, we knew that we're gonna have some, you know, some throwaway with that because it was a completely no burn genetics in that buck. So it was a 100% out cross for us. And that was one of the neat things, you know, with him, you know, and also one of the scary things is, you know, we knew it was going to be 100%, you know, hybrid bigger, you know, kick the door down and, you know, either swinging a miss or, you know, home run. So what we did is we actually took the 15. I thought what I thought were the 15 best females that we had on the farm. We just kind of, we swing hard and we, you know, bought a half a jump of semen and we bred those 15 donors to them and you know, flushed and, you know, to be honest, you know, hit it out of the park, in my opinion, for, you know, for where we're at. Got a buck called Walk this way that hit well. We had a bunch of winners that hit well. We red walked this way back in and got a buck called all natty this next year that hit really, you know, that had a successful year this first year for us. And just kind of, it's as we kind of take that from a half out cross to a quarter out cross. And now with our son's Gucci and a couple of those other buck lambs, you know, to a quarter out cross, an eighth out cross. I mean, it's kind of we were able to bring that genetic piece in and then kind of just dilute it back down into where we got the pieces. We wanted to give us a new outside look, but still have that genetic base that we've always, you know, had that's been successful and consistent for us.
- [16:55]
Weston Hendricks
So awesome. I've heard, I think it was. We did an episode with Chance Neff, and he brought up unicorn. I think a couple times from what I'd heard from Chance, that unicorn did wonders for the sheep world. I don't know why I'm not. I'm not a sheep kid. I. The only thing I did was show goats, and I did that for a while. So I just got to look at the sheep at the shows and, oh, that one looks cool. But the unicorn is Chance Neff told me he did wonders for the sheep world.
- [17:26]
Tyson Rule
That buck was wild. I remember, you know, I saw him at probably three weeks of age in Elk City, Oklahoma. And, you know, it was. It was a. There's a few bucks that you remember when they're babies, you know, and that was, you know, that was one, you know, break. The Internet was one. You know, we have a buck that we're working on now called behind the Enemy Lines, you know, where you, you know, they hit you hard. And he was one that, you know, I was trying to buy him, right, you know, from. From get. You know, from the get go, just because you. You had that feeling that that one was going to be special. And we're still showing. We got sheep in our show barn this year that are, you know, he's a 2019 model, so he's, in theory, six years old, and we're still showing lamps that are directly, you know, derivatives of his. Of his. So. Or direct, you know, direct lamps out of him. So it's wild that he can be that, you know, that successful, you know, six years later for sure.
- [18:11]
Weston Hendricks
What I want to know. Now we're talking about buck so much. What is it that you believe makes a buck? Promotional type. What do you believe is setting standards right now for the industry to say, hey, we need to AI to this book and use him as a. As a foundation to start something.
- [18:33]
Tyson Rule
You know, I think the. The first thing that we do is, you know, we. It comes down to the females. I mean, you know, we're. We're so selective on, you know, we run 2,000 years, like I told you. I mean, we'll have, you know, a ton of babies a year. You know, there's. On the black side, there's 1200-1500 babies that are born on our, in our, in our flock a year. But of that, I mean there's a hundred that are in the, you know, they're in the realm of, you know, that caliber that they can hit that point, you know. And a lot of people are always like, hey, I love, you know, they'll love a sheep. And they're like, hey, I want, you know, I want you to price that one to me as a buck. And you know, to us, you know, that one's the state fair champion. That one's not. That one's not our stud ramp. For us it's just because, you know, the mom's not proven. You know, she might be a good mom, but she's not a great mom. You know, we look for those ones that those moms have, you know, they were special show use or they were their mamas, especially you. Or there's elite, you know, breeding pieces, those females or there's a consistent, you know, sales record behind those females. You know, and if you really track those female lions hard, you watch to see what those lambs are out of. I mean, you know, like our, our Gucci buck lamb. I mean his mama was a crazy looking deal and every one of her flushmates are awesome. You know, every one of Gucci's flushmates are awesome. You know, you just look at that consistent line of that side, you know, to walk this way. His mom was Clementine. She was a amazingly high quality show you that was unique and had crazy pieces that no one else in the industry had at that point. So trying to find those females that are the elite pieces because you know, all of us can breed to the same bucks now. I mean, so, you know, with AI, I mean it kind of, you know, keeps the, the cool thing is it makes the guy that has five views, you know, on the same level playing field as a guy that has 2000 like me. So it gives, you know, it gives the kind of the same advantage for the young kids that start now. But the advantage goes to the guy that has, you know, the elite females. And that's where we've tried to really stay at. So that's the first thing that we look for, you know, and, and then it's just really being able to evaluate stock. I mean it's, it sounds kind of a little bit maybe arrogant, but you know, there's a lot of, you know, there's a lot to just being able to look at those things and see enough babies in a, in an annual period or in a lifetime. To know that, hey, this one's elite, you know, or this one's exotic, or this one's got those extra pieces and those bells and whistles that the rest of them don't, you know, and not be barn blind, you know, Like, I still ask a lot of other people's opinions, you know, because I'll find the ones I like and I'll go to other people's places. And I still ask, you know, a select group of, you know, 10 to 15 people, you know, that have gone around too, and asked them what they think because, you know, you can kind of get yourself kind of caught up in a little bit of a, you know, in a barn blind situation where you want to get some different opinions on them. But it's, you know, you have to be extremely selective and you can't, you know, just can't say, hey, I want to raise one. So I'm going to keep this one because it's not the right female. You can't just keep, you know, one because you think it's built the right way. I mean, it has to have every single one of those boxes checked. It has to, you know, be exceptional in every single one of those characters.
- [21:15]
Weston Hendricks
Right, right. So what I want to know now is types and kinds of show sheep that are winning right now. I don't, I follow some of the show sheep champions just because I'm a livestock judger. I need to know what a good sheep looks like. Right. All these things. But has it changed over the course? Last per se, 10 years, the champion show sheep, grand championship sheep, whatever. Do they need to be thinner heighted? Do they need to be longer neck? Do they need to have a flat shoulder? Do they need to drop in a flank more now? I don't know. I want to know from you what, what is a high quality show sheep look like right now?
- [21:50]
Tyson Rule
They're better built. I mean, is the easiest way to look at them, you know, And I would say that the judges that we are getting today can rebuild a lot better than they could, you know, five years, 10 years ago. Or the sheep are just being better built so it's easier to rebuild. You know, we look back and, you know, the design that we have to the ribbons, their front one third of their shoulder. You know, how they're built for their, you know, front one third, their height of their shoulder, their ability to be wide pinned and still be tall shouldered, their ability to be round, ribbed and be tall shouldered. I mean, those were things that we just didn't have 10 years ago and the sheep are just better in general. If you look at the amount of leg wool and presentation that coast the sheep, I mean, it's just so much better. I mean, 10 years ago, you know, you could show up, you know, and not have to worry about presentation at all and go in a county fair. I mean, now you go to a county fair and you know, your top five in class are just crazy as far as presentation. They look like they're going to a national show. I mean, they're fuzzy legged, they're clipped out to the, you know, to the gills. And it's a, you know, it's a, it's a selection criteria which I know gets frustrating for some of the guys that like when I go to Oklahoma Youth Expo and you know, the Texas majors because, you know, it looks like the, hey, the stiff line is the ones that weren't, you know, you know, weren't, you know, didn't weren't taken care of for leg wool or presentation, you know, and the ones that made the stiff were the ones that are taking care. But it's, it's truly, that's, that's a big difference. You can just tell from the get go ones that are exercise hard, the ones that are fit well and taken care of. So I'd say the type of sheep hasn't really changed. I think the sheep are just better, you know, and then, but the biggest thing is like the presentation. I mean, I think supplements have gotten better, I think exercise has gotten better. I think daily care has gotten better along with that. I guess the, the root of all evil is that it takes a lot more time to get one ready than it did, you know, 10 years ago. You know, 10 years ago we could get, you know, it was, it was not a problem for one kid to have 10, 15 sheep, you know, and you kind of divvy them up and you could, you know, in theory you could buy $2,500 sheep and you buy 10 of them and be able to, you know, be in a elite show family. And you know, maybe you get three or four that turn out at the end of the day anymore, you know, one kid, you know, you get four, you know, four to five is a max that one kid can take care of in a year. I mean, right season just, they take so much time and so much effort, man. Especially if you got little kids, it might be three. I mean, two to three. So that's, that's what's really changes the amount of presentation more than just the sheep themselves, you know, but all right.
- [24:06]
Guys, we're going to take just a minute to recognize the businesses and operations that have powered this episode and we pride ourselves in standing by businesses and operations that make an impact in this industry and Trademark Genetics is one of them. At Trademark Genetics, they are committed to excellence in every aspect of their family owned and operated business specializing in elite Red Angus and Red Brangus genetics. They pride themselves on breeding cattle that perform exceptionally in real world conditions, delivering superior quality and lasting value. Whether you are in search of a project for a young exhibitor or looking to enhance your herd with fresh, proven genetics, their mission is to produce high caliber livestock while fostering lifelong relationships. Their bull battery and donor females are rooted in generations of proven performance, maternal strength and impeccable structural integrity traits that add tangible value. Whether your focus is on cow power or carcass quality, they are pleased to offer embryos and semen from standout sires and proven donors across both breeds. Whether establishing a foundation or elevating an existing program, their genetics are designed to advance your operation with confidence. Owned and operated by John Mandy and Madison Fisher, Trademark Genetics is dedicated to exceeding customer expectations through unparalleled quality and service. We encourage you to connect with Mandy at 713-204-7535 or Madison at 832-963-4233 to explore how they can support your goals. Discover the latest cattle offerings and stay informed on their journey by visiting trademarkgenetics.com and follow them on Facebook and TikTok. But if you're looking for a club calf producer that's diverse in almost every aspect, Reed Vessel Ranches is your answer.
- [25:54]
Luke or Quinn
Reed Vessel Ranches is a premier ranching operation specializing in the production of top tier show cattle offering a wide range of American, British and exotic breeds. Over the course of just five years, RVR has grown from four donors and 20 AI cows to over 50 donors and 500 AI cows, ensuring their commitment to quality and excellence. Their success is rooted in a strategic, intentional approach, planning years in advance to maximize the potential for their customers to succeed in the showroom.
- [26:25]
Tyson Rule
In addition to breeding competitive show cattle, Reed Vessel Ranch's team is dedicated dedicated to offering a full range of services for show preparation, from clipping and fitting to feed management and expert show assistance, RVR ensures that their clients are fully supported throughout the entire process.
- [26:41]
Luke or Quinn
For more information about Reed Vessel Ranches, including their private treaty cattle, SARS donors and upcoming sales, visit their website@reedvesselranches.com but.
- [26:52]
Tyson Rule
If you're looking for proven club calf sires Then stay tuned in.
- [26:56]
Luke or Quinn
At Hartman show cattle, they believe and stand by the saying, in order to predict the future, you must create it. Which is one of the reasons why they have become so profound in terms of promoting their bulls and show progeny.
- [27:09]
Tyson Rule
They have focused on promoting bulls that are backed by pedigrees, knowing that their cow families have a proven track record and their cow families and legacy is what helps ensure predictability and consistency when using their bulls on your cows.
- [27:22]
Luke or Quinn
Speaking of promoting bulls, have you heard of pure reflection? Well, if you have, you've noticed many of his high sellers and contenders in big ring settings. He speaks for himself and is only DS positive.
- [27:34]
Tyson Rule
And when I say he speaks for himself, he sired the next promo bull named born to win, and he's a TH&DS carrier. And the Dame herself has produced over 175,000 in 2024 on just six head.
- [27:48]
Luke or Quinn
But if you're looking for no genetic defects, that's built into a gray hided bull named return on investment. This triple clean bull's damage also produced the grand champion steer at Denver in 2024.
- [28:00]
Tyson Rule
If you have any questions at all, don't hesitate to reach out to Aaron hartman himself at 502-655-8323.
- [28:07]
Weston Hendricks
And you mentioned daily care a minute ago. I want to know what is what yalls protocol on the daily for show sheep? Like, like leg wraps? What, what do y' all use to enhance hair on the legs? What is it that y' all use to thin hide? How do you get one's back shape fresh? What, what all does that in. In entail?
- [28:31]
Tyson Rule
You know, we feed, we, everybody feeds twice a day, you know, so we start them and you know, they, they get kind of group fed until they hit about a hundred pounds and we start kind of going more towards the individual, you know, you know, individual feed system. You know, for daily care, I kind of walk, you know, we feed in the mornings. After that, you know, the sheep get about an hour back in the pens and we'll start going through on a three day, three day rotation where take them out of the pen, halter them up, unwrap their legs, rinse legs down, condition. We'll put them on a circle walker and let them get some air, kind of move them around. They'll be that for 15 to 20 minutes. We'll put them on a treadmill and kind of break them when they're, when they're little, just to walk backwards on it. When they're kind of more mature and they're 130, 140, £50. They're exercising hard. Then they'll actually, we'll turn them around and make them walk on all four legs forwards on a sprint, they'll go anywhere from four minutes if they're thin to 10 to 15 minutes if they're, if they're chubby and we'll run them hard. I mean, they're true athletes that point. We'll take them off, we'll kind of time up, let them kind of just have to kind of pose for a little bit, take them back over the walking stands, blow legs out, do a little bit of showmanship work maybe before that, then rewrap legs and put them back in the pen. So that's a. Three days a week, you know, to start out with. You know, if they're, if we're getting close to showing their elite and they're mature, they might be, we might be hitting them five days a week. So it's like I said, when you're going to, you know, be, you know, when you're going to be elite, you know, and you're going to take, you know, go to a bigger show, I mean, five sheep for one kid's a lot of, in a lot of effort to do that. I mean it's a, that's a two hour process every night, you know, so, right, you know, you try to do that with, you know, 10 sheep and all of a sudden you're, you know, you're four hours every night after school. It's hard to have a, have a life and you know, have a work life, you know, a school life, balance, schools, you know, show jock and balance doing that with 10 sheep. So, right, where, you know, prices have gone up and you know, the quality sheep have gone up and it's the amount of time it takes per sheep has gone up, you know, on, you know, the supplement world's gone up, you know, a ton too. Meaning, like, you know, they're so much more advanced than they were, you know, back in the day. Like, you know, I used to, you know, I used to be a big purina guy. You know, we'd feed, you know, you know, a fat supplement, a protein supplement, you know, some, you know, tweak some bells here. But, you know, now we're feeding, you know, gut health from day one. We're feeding, you know, extra chelated minerals from day one. We're feeding a melatonin base from day one, you know, just to maximize leg wall growth and maximize, you know, skin and hair. We're maximizing, you know, Every bit of immunity, immunity boosting system we can, because we want those things to be, you know, they're, you know, their insulin levels to be maxed out. We want, you know, everything as far as muscle building to be maxed out. I mean, we want to have, you know, blood flow rolling everything we can as far as to have that animal as healthy and as bigger, you know, as high end of an athlete as you can possibly have that thing. So when they step on that treadmill, they're ready for an exercise, they're ready for a workout, you know, and we use a product called Race Day. You know, we just, we love. Because, I mean, it's as far as being able to push, you know, a lot of fluid. Extra, you know, take fluid and push it into the muscle to kind of really help, you know, build. Build an extra amount of expression as well. You know, it's just. It's wild. The amount of extra, you know, the extras that are now into the supplement world that are kind of really defining the difference between, you know, the, the good feeders and the great feeders, right?
- [31:32]
Weston Hendricks
Yes, sir. And so you did mention you're a big purina guy back in the day. It. What show feed do y' all feed now? Is that something that you make specifically or is that something that you buy?
- [31:45]
Tyson Rule
Something we make specifically. So, you know, we've, you know, there's a lot of good show feeds out there. You know, we've, you know, we've used them all. You know, we had. We were, you know, we used to be with a big, you know, a big national brand. Then we had a local brand making a feed for us on kind of a custom base. For a while it got to the point where we kind of wanted to tweak, you know, tweak ours quite a bit. And then, you know, we love that, you know, that mixture. And we kind of felt like we really learned how to feed it well. And we call it the rival feed. And we would, you know, all of a sudden we started winning with a bunch. And then all of a sudden our customers, you know, wanted to feed it too. So, you know, as our supplement line worked and all of a sudden everybody wanted to have a base feed to go with it. So, you know, we went from just kind of, hey, it's our feed that we wanted to use locally that we keep fresh, to now we gotta figure out how to distribute this stuff across the country. So that was. That was a whole new challenge also from, you know, we were more of a supplement company than when we Kind of, you know, turned into a feed and supplement company kind of in 22. So that was. That was kind of a big transition for us. And, you know, we brought Blaine Rogers in at that time to kind of help us with that process on getting distribution throughout the United States. And help us where, you know, he had his cattle feed that was called arrival Feed, also in California. And we helped expand, you know, the. Oh, the rival brand out into California with the sheep and goat feed and pig feed now. And then also, you know, brought all the. All of. All the feeds to the Midwest, and have kind of worked on expanding it, you know, just mainly in the Midwest. And now we're kind of working on the east coast and. And South. South regions, too.
- [33:13]
Weston Hendricks
Awesome. Awesome. And so you did mention real supplements. So now we got to talk about it. When did it start? Why did it start? How did you make it start?
- [33:23]
Tyson Rule
So it started about 2016. I was out in California doing some artificial insemination for, oh, a big, big kind of holland day that we have out there. And we were just discussing, you know, back at that point, we were still selling some cleanup rams. So we're. And we just sell a $5,000 ram. And it seemed like that was one of our biggest struggles in the industry was when you sell a cleanup ram, it was kind of going to more guys that, you know, they'd do a little bit of AI Work, but they really wanted a ram that to take home and breed to their use. And those guys weren't the ones that were really taking care of their bucks the best. So we'd struggle with, you know, they'd call up and say, hey, the buck's not fertile, you know, and you, you know, anyways, you want to just kind of make it right for them, you get the buck back. And he was always in really poor, you know, nutritional condition. He was either skinny, looked like he was kind of starved, his hooves were cracked. You know, there was just looked like just a malnourishment issue. You know, maybe it was wool picked. You know, it's just, you know, breeding, you know, a bunch of use is hard on a ram. I mean, no different than it is on bulls and so forth. So I was just sitting, you know, sitting and kind of, you know, cussing, discussing with customers that were, you know, that were all standing around there while I was doing the AI Work of just wishing that I could come up with a better solution for, you know, when I sell a ram of, you know, how to make these customers just take care of them, you know, and how I want to, how do we, you know, make a guarantee? How do I get a customer a guarantee that they will take care of the buck, but they got to give me a guarantee that they'll take care of the buck also. And kind of a wild deal, I had a guy named Jed Asmus that was an AI customer of mine. And lo and behold, he's a dairy nutritionist. He was just sitting there over in the corner and his wheels were spinning 1,000 miles an hour. And he oversees 40,000 dairy cows out there. And the nutrition side, we finished up the AI and he came up to me and he's like, hey, I think I got an answer for your solution if you're interested. I think I'd like you to try out a product. I can kind of formulate something up for you and have you try it. So we came up with a product called Macho man that, you know, in, you know, the entire process of it for, hey, when I sell a ram, I put, you know, send them a bucket of matcha, man, they feed that supplement to the ram, you know, from day one till, you know, the end of breed season. And we, you know, at that point, you know, solved our fertility issue. I mean, we had, you know, it went from having four to five bucks that people would be sending back a year out of, you know, 50, you know, that were, you know, kind of a 10% kickback to, you know, maybe one, you know, one or two. So it was awesome as far as, you know, hey, our, you know, our return rates on, you know, infertile bucks, you know, just kind of diminished completely. You know, Jed and I got to be really good friends at that point, you know, and we decided to form in overall supplements. And we came back and then had a, we need something for donors because, you know, we solved the ram problem. So, hey, we now got the semen thing figured out and he is, you know, the next thing he said, hey, I gotta wait. You know, you're doing all this embryo transfer work and flush work. How do we get better, higher quality eggs? And how do we make sure that, you know, these donors, you know, produce more eggs and flush more eggs for us, you know, and that they, you know, we get some of the receipts of those embryos, you know, that we do implant those recipes. They stick. So it started out kind of as a, as a repro based company. We ran that probably for two or three years. And Jed's kids were starting to get serious at showing at that point. And this was probably about when Madison was You know, probably also starting to get, you know, pretty seriousness showing probably in 2017, 2018. So I, I made my kids kind of wait. We were a little different. Like, you know, a lot of kids start showing their, you know, kind of 8, 9, 10, their parents push them hard to kind of burn them out. And I, I waited for Madison. Like, we didn't let her go to the national shows until she got to be a freshman in high school. And, you know, her. My goal was always to try to go win, you know, every one of the national shows before she graduated. And so we were going to push hard and we kind of saw some, some pretty big, you know, some holes in the supplement world as far as, like, hey, how I wanted to feed sheep and how, you know, it's working. And you know, Jed and I kind of decided at that point, like, well, if we're gonna, you know, if we want to try to be aggressive on the speed thing, you know, we maybe have to kind of just figure out how to, you know, fill those holes herself. So he and I sat down and kind of put a playbook together of, you know, what we wanted to accomplish, you know, with how to feed sheep. And, you know, and he, you know, I come up with, you know, the why of what we want to do and how, you know, how we want to do it. And he'd come up with the science behind it, you know, and he's, he's kind of the crazy scientist in the background that would, you know, pull things out of, hey, here's some things that were, you know, some, some wild, you know, organic minerals and, you know, elements that are pulling out of, you know, you know, the Philippines, you know, that we can, you know, implement in and some new science that they're doing that out of UC Davis that, you know, they're just, you know, just testing different processes in the dairy world that, you know, hey, based on some of the side effects that they're getting in that world that might solve what you're trying to get, you know, accomplished, you know, in, you know, with your, you know, with your land projects. So it's kind of, it was kind of a fun, you know, seven, eight month process where we went from you know, really having zero show products to all of a sudden we had a, you know, a full line of, you know, small ruminant products. So that's where in theory, you know, our formula, our thick, our shredded and our race day, those first four base products that, you know, kind of are still big stables today came out of. And it's it's been wild just to see, you know, those products go from, you know, our show barn and the amount of success we went, you know, from, you know, kind of being the first guys could try them out to now they're, you know, nationwide. And I would say, you know, with rule stuff inside, say, well, there's more shows that we have, you know, five of the, you know, four of the top five, you know, national champions at a show than there are, you know, shows that we don't have one at it. So.
- [38:25]
Weston Hendricks
Right.
- [38:26]
Tyson Rule
Been crazy.
- [38:27]
Weston Hendricks
Yeah, for sure. So those first four or five products that you named off, I would like to know the process and the science behind it, why you made it, maybe the story as well.
- [38:38]
Tyson Rule
I can't tell you the science because I'm not smart enough. I'll let you know that right now. So that's where. That's why, you know, that's why Jed has the big PhDs and those guys that, you know, they're gonna be able to tell you a lot more on that side. I get to be. I get to tell you the how. So, like the thick product, you know, I needed a product that in theory, hey, I didn't want to, you know, we were using Dine to try to get our lambs, you know, to get chubby. Chubby early for Sal and trying to get some extra bloom because at that point, you know, lambs didn't have quite enough muscle. So we were trying to get them to chub up early to get some extra base with. So it didn't just grow out of their muscle, but the goal was, you know, how do we get them to do that but not just lay on, you know, not. Not use dying, where it kind of burned their guts out a little bit, made them scour a bunch and kind of put on a soft fat. So I wanted something that was going to put on, you know, a bloom and a bulk, but, you know, also kind of. And also at the same time be able to be enough calories that could kind of build some muscle at the same time. So that was kind of, you know, how do we take the product called Dine and how do we make it better and, you know, and better for their gut and better for trying to build muscle rather than just lay on fat. The shredded product was one that, you know, we had. There's a lot of, like, fat burners, but there wasn't a lot of deals that could burn a little bit of fat and build a lot of muscle. And so that was one where, you know, Hey, I wanted an amino acid profile. I wanted a lot of, you know, pro, you know, it's kind of, you know, room and bypass proteins, you know, or some of the scientific terms. I guess he'll go on that side. And just like that was my goal was like, instead of just having a high protein fish meals, blood meals, plasmas, I was like, I wanted some things that, you know, hey, in the, in the human world, what can, what are they using, you know, what are they using in more the, you know, athlete based steels to build muscle along with kind of that, you know, scientific, on the scientific side will kind of also maybe burn some fat at the same time. But I don't want to burn a whole lot of fat because, you know, in theory all these animals need to look smooth, you know, or maybe like the purina products, the fitter 35s and 52s were probably burning them up a little bit too much, make them a little bit too raw so they're top shape. We were losing some top shape. I wanted something that would, you know, in theory, build muscle up and then at the same time maybe just kind of firm them up and give them a little bit harder look so I could burn the fat by exercising. But this probably would build muscle. So that was my shredded product formula was mainly just, hey, I wanted a good product that make them convert better, that would make their leg hair, you know, stronger, that would, you know, make them healthy. So I never had to worry about, you know, these things going off feed Coccidia is always a hard problem. So I want them to be able to, you know, keep them, you know, keep their guts good, make sure, you know, keep their stools good. So whenever they do stress out, when we kind of, you know, minimize fungus, you know, because whenever sheep gets stressed out, I mean, the first thing that happens is they usually scour. And the second thing is they usually get fungus. So if I come up with a product that would keep their gut healthy kind of work from the inside out, I thought that would kind of give us a big leg up for every one of our customers is if we can, you know, for the majority of the customers, as long as we can keep those animals healthy, the rest of the products can kind of, you know, do their work from that point on. Even if they're an advanced feeder, if they were, you know, you know, entry level feeder, that was the easy step to, you know, maximize their programs. The race day was kind of a wild product that was kind of, it's kind of still the unique science that you know, I was looking for a product, you know, kind of a. In theory, it started out with kind of like, hey, I want something like for the last push to kind of, you know, add, you know, add expression, add shape. So, you know, we were using a product called propylene glycol, kind of, in theory to kind of have a big sugar push to kind of help build, you know, kind of swell muscle, kind of help, you know, bring hydration back to the sheep. Well, this product was one that they're using in dairy cows and they were actually using it to produce more milk per cow, per, you know, per day. And what it would do is it would actually take, you know, fluid out of the GI tract and out of the rumen and it would actually push it, you know, back into the tissue of the cow and then in, you know, back to the udder to make it produce more milk. It worked great. The downside was it was very uneconomical in the dairy world. So, you know, it had no practical, you know, value for, you know, the dairy industry on that side. But we found out that was when we gave the sheep, you know, it did this, you know, exact same thing. You know, hey, any extra fluids that you gave them, like, so when we give them our drenches and so forth, rather than just going into the room and and get peed out, it actually would make them reabsorb that fluid back into the muscle. And in theory, it would make them, you know, just make their muscle continue to hydrate up and to continue to swell and swell. So we started with, you know, kind of on the process of, hey, let's give it to them the last 14 days. And you know, as we kind of progressed on, we learned that, you know, to be honest, I mean, the, you know, we keep them on it almost now on a, on a full time basis where if we want to keep those things fresh and just kind of continue to grow muscle as we go throughout the summer, I mean, that's where they just start on it and, and almost they never hollow out. They never get, you know, they never get stale feeling. They always stay fresh, they always stay bulky topped. And it's been one of those things that, you know, we've, it's probably one of our best, you know, kept secrets as far as one of our products that, you know, not everybody knows about, but, you know, is the one, the guys that do know about it, you know, live and die by it. So it's been, it's been an awesome product for us.
- [43:19]
Weston Hendricks
That's awesome. What else I want to ask you with within rural supplements is why do you think y' all are different? And what do you think makes y'.
- [43:29]
Tyson Rule
All.
- [43:31]
Weston Hendricks
The face of the sheep industry, per se, in terms of supplements or even goats as well? And now y' all are even. You told me earlier, multi species. What do you think sets apart rule supplements?
- [43:42]
Tyson Rule
You know, I think the big thing that's different, Russ, is, you know, you know, we're in the trenches, you know, where, you know, myself, you know, Blaine Rogers, you know, some of our influencers on the. On the cattle side and the goat side. I mean, we're, you know, we're the guys that are out there feeding these animals every day. I mean, you know, we get to make the tweaks that, you know, if we see products saying, you know, the things. If the products aren't working the way we, you know, we don't want them to, we make the changes, you know, where, you know, let's say corporate, you know, corporate America, you know, you know, the sales reps are out there using the products. If they don't like the products, they got to go to, you know, their sales rep or their sales manager, and then they got to go to a nutritionist, and they got to go through, you know, red tape and corporate processes to make a formulation change. And if, you know, if the formulation change, you know, raises prices, I mean, just. It just doesn't happen, you know. So one of the big things for us is, you know, we're. There's just not as many, you know, steps, and there's not, you know, the red tape to get through it. So if we don't like the way something works, you know, and we do all, you know, we do the trials and errors ourselves. The best thing, you know, I think about our company is the fact that we're in the trenches and we're the ones making the, you know, making the product. So, you know, we actually see if they work or if they don't work. And if they don't work, we scrap it. You know, there's, you know, probably been 20 to 30 products that we've kind of have tried out that never made to market because we didn't think they, you know, broad enough value to the customer.
- [44:53]
Weston Hendricks
Wow.
- [44:53]
Tyson Rule
You know, so I think that's a big part of it. No, I think the fact that we can keep, you know, we can have higher quality products with better ingredients at a lower price point than, you know, the big guys, you know, we don't have bloated salaries that Are, you know, going to, you know, you know, you know, soccer game, you know, you know, the World cup and going to the, you know, Kentucky Derby races and all those deals. I mean, I wish we did, you know, I wish we had a, you know, corporate jet that, you know, flew around the country. You know, we got a, I got a little four seater that, you know, takes me across the country is all I get. So, you know, we, we keep our costs low and our, in our, you know, with that, you know, we're able to keep our margins, you know, smaller and you know, keep things tighter, you know, than the big guys. So we can, you know, we can sell, you know, more stuff in bulk and direct to consumers and keep our cost, you know, cost points lower, you know, with better, you know, with better products. So that's the wild part. I mean, so we've always looked at, you know, our products and we know that our ingredients cost more than, you know, the big guys, but we can still sell our products at the same price as those guys. So that's, that's the, that's the cool part for us. So with that we feel like our products work better. That's where we get the results that customers want and that's why they keep coming back.
- [45:58]
Weston Hendricks
Yes, sir. Now what I want to know, I kind of, in this divot of social media and advertising, we've gotten a lot better. But it's something I lacked for a really long time. Didn't realize how influential it could actually be. So for instance, three weeks ago I actually finally boosted a Facebook post. Never knew what it did, but I did it and I got like 50,000 new impressions on my Facebook profile. And I'm like, I wish I'd have done this a year ago. So figuring all that out, but that's something I want to ask you is y' all are heavy, heavy, heavy on marketing and advertising, specifically Facebook. That's kind of how I found y', all, to be honest with you. And so how has that helped? What do you think it does for you? And just, I don't know, I got so many questions about social media because it does so many things.
- [46:50]
Tyson Rule
You know, I think you know, the best thing about social media is it helps tell your story. You know, there's the hard part about social media is it only tells the story that the, the algorithm, let's lets it tell you. So, you know, it's a, it's a double edged sword. You know, I, we love it and we hate it. So you know, I, I love the fact that we can go direct to our, you know, to our followers, you know, and if the algorithm lets it, I mean, we can tell, tell a cool story. We can tell them how to use products. We can get, you know, get direct to them. You know, we can help them answer problems. You know, that's where I, I love dms. You know, to be honest, we probably get, you know, people don't realize this, but we get probably 200 dms a day. You know, where people are sending us messages like, hey, here's my animal. You know, here's what we're feeding it, you know, you know, what do you think? And we'll, we answer every single one of them and either myself or one of the guys on the sales teams, you know, we'll answer directly or something on the marketing team. And, you know, we try to make sure everything goes through. So I mean, you know, if you guys are sending those out and keep sending them because, you know, we, we love trying to help. You know, social media is awesome. You know, the hard part is, you know, like, where we're at now, it's a weird transition, you know, you know, the Showtimes magazine is still kicking it. We try to advertise with those guys, but there's just, you know, there's not a lot of other ways to get out to customers. You know, we, you know, we don't want to stand at a booth, you know, for, you know, 15 days if we don't have to, you know, and just kind of shake hands and, you know, have bloated salaries and, you know, and bloated hotel bills and, you know, dinners out. We're trying to keep our product, our costs low, trying to tell our story and get to customers, you know, the best way we can. You know, one of the most economical ways to do it is social media. You know, with that, you know, we got a pretty good, you know, we got a pretty awesome team. You know, I can't take very much credit for my, My wife leads the social media team. So she has a couple, you know, a couple different girls that all run that deal for, you know, with her and for. And they do an awesome job, to be honest. I can't take, you know, any credit for it. We get out, we get awesome interns, we got awesome full time, we got awesome contractors, and they, you know, they put together a plan and, you know, I get to kind of, I get to kind of say some yes and no's once in a while on it, but to be honest, all that credit goes to her. So I Wish I'm not gonna be very much help for you, Weston, on that one because it's, you know, it's a, it's a daily battle for us and we love it and we hate it all at the same time, you know, And I, I, you know, I wish that, I wish that I knew that when we put a post out there, there was a way to get it out to every single one of our followers so they could get to see it all the time. Because I think there's a lot of valuable information that we can get out to people, and I hope it sees everybody. But you just never do know if it does or not. I mean, you know, when you see a post get shared 500 times, you know, that, you know, that gets out to them. But hey, when you have, you know, here's a new product and here's how I want you guys to use it, you know, and hey, here's some success that we're seeing sometimes that, you know, sometimes that post doesn't get out to everybody. So that's the, that's the downside.
- [49:21]
Weston Hendricks
Right, right. And I mean, the biggest thing that I think I've had to fight with is, is trying to get the actual post or reel out to the people. Because all I see from the past two seasons is, well, this reel has 3, 000 listens or this reel has 5, 000. And I'm sitting here, I'm like, well, I have this many people viewing my profile and it don't have that many views, so what am I doing wrong? So just trying to grow and, and we're getting a lot better. And now that I've hired Quinn, he's been a real big help as well. But with that said, I want to know what the future of real supplements looks like.
- [49:59]
Tyson Rule
You know, we're, we're trying to get, you know, distributions are our big one right now. We feel like we got great products. We have a ton of people that, you know, want to get them, you know, faster, quicker, be able to walk in the store, you know, you know, we're really good at, you know, direct consumer. If, you know, the Amazon model, you know, we were one of the first guys, you know, one of the things that was successful for us is we, you know, you know, you can go to our website if you place an order by 10 o' clock that morning, you know, it gets shipped out that afternoon. You know, we shipped out 300 boxes today. I mean, so it's, you know, one of those deals that it's always crazy you know, so that part's just always wild, you know, and if those boxes go out today, then they'll get pretty much anywhere in the US By Wednesday. You know, Wednesday, you know, to your UPS customer. Maybe Thursday if you're going to California. Right. That part's awesome. You know, the downside is there's, you know, in the animal industry, we're not always the best planners. You know, Weston, you know, there's, there's some, you know, some kid that all of a sudden, hey, they forgot that they were, you know, they were almost out of, you know, the bark and they're, you know, they, their, their dad switched up the board or something like that on them. And so all of a sudden now they're feeding twice as much. So they're out and all of a sudden now it's, it's time that, hey, they, they need a bucket tomorrow. So I got to figure out how to get, you know, trying to figure out how to get that bucket to them tomorrow versus, you know, you know, versus, you know, hey, a three day lag for, you know, for shipping, you know, online is, is been our, our struggle. Trying to, you know, just help customers get product faster. So trying to get our dealership model put together, our distribution model so, you know, we can have more feed stores throughout the country that can carry stuff, you know, where we, you know, you're within a 30 minute or an hour drive to go pick up, you know, our supplements. You know, that's kind of our next big, next big push. You know, we, we really love our products that we have. We think the, you know, the entire, you know, the pig line's been killing it. I mean, it was really cool. Like a lot of people don't realize, but, you know, we had the champion pig, the champion U and the champion steer. And one of the, I guess it was the full blood, full blood goat. All four champions at Louisville were on our, our feed. So I mean, that was, that was kind of a cool thing, you know, for the, you know, we're the small guy. You know, we're not the, you know, we're not the million dollar Purina company. We're not the million dollar all tech company. I mean, we're the, you know, we're the small guys that don't have a lot of customers. You know, we're, you know, we have a lot of customers, but we ship out a lot of stuff. But I mean, we're not the, like I said, the, the big name guys that have the, you know, the 200 head, you know, 200 employee staffs that are running around. So.
- [52:13]
Weston Hendricks
Right, right.
- [52:14]
Tyson Rule
It was. It's been pretty cool. So, you know, that's trying to get, you know, trying to get products to customers faster, you know. You know, I love. One of the things that we do that I think makes us different, too, is I love finding new products like Will Winter's punch. He's down there in Texas. By. I mean, whenever Will came out that product, I tried, you know, I was the first guy to try to come, you know, come get. I was like, hey, I think this is awesome. He was telling me about it. I wouldn't pick it up right away. And Will gave me the absolutely not. You know, this is my baby. We're rolling with it. Well, you know, three years later, Will realizes that, you know, run a supplement company isn't, you know, it's. It's. It's pretty easy when your business, you know, when it's. When it's small, once it starts taking off and you got another business that's rolling, it gets a little tricky. So what, you know, we've. What I love doing is kind of going with, you know, just my friends that have successful, you know, kind of. I call it, you know, small business. You know, small businesses and help them kind of distribute, you know, build up distribution also.
- [53:06]
Weston Hendricks
Right, right.
- [53:07]
Tyson Rule
With, you know, that side, you know, it's really hard for a feed store to buy five buckets of punch from Will and redistribute it. But for me, I can, you know, I can send five buckets with a pallet that I'm sending to that feed store and ship that to that customer real easily. So, you know, we've, you know, we picked. We're doing all the distribution for Will on punch now and, you know, and Darby Ross on sureshine and some of those other products. That's. It's been awesome, you know, so one, it allows those customers to, you know, to, you know, have a product that they've built and developed and it helps, you know, allows me to help them kind of get it distributed to the masses. So it's cool for me to let you know what, you know, we both get to work together on it. Where they have a product that's awesome, works well, and I get to help them, you know, expand that product to make it, you know, bigger, better, faster, and, you know, get it out to more people. So it makes us both more successful. So that's. That's been a cool part for us, and I want to do more of that. You know, I'M always looking for, you know, the new products we just picked up, optiwise, because I think we were using that product. I thought it was awesome. You know, Jamie Smith, Dina, they, they recommended the product to us, we tried it, and one of their friends was one of the owners of it. And we're, you know, we're now a distributor of the product to, you know, where, hey, we can get it out to our customers. You know, like I said, next, next day, same day, all the time, all the time for them. So that's been a product we just picked up and we have about five or six new ones that are coming down the line that will be out this next, probably 60 days that customers will be able to go on the website, pick up right away, or feed source, can pick up, you know, directly from us on their pallet orders. So I, you know, I love those type of things where, you know, hey, a customer, you know, kind of starts a small little business that kind of kicks out, you know, they got some products that are rolling, but maybe they can't be real efficient at it the way they're doing it. Lane Hail in Texas, I mean, we were west, west draw Texas halters, and we now distribute all of his halters for him. So, you know, he was having a hard time keeping up with all the demand. And so, you know, there we just said, hey, we'll take over all of it for you. You ship, you know, ship us, you know, a couple hundred halters, you know, a month, 300, 400, whatever he sends us. I think it was 700 halters last month. So I think we, we overworked him a little bit.
- [54:58]
Weston Hendricks
Oh, wow.
- [54:59]
Tyson Rule
Sorry, Lane, if you're on there anyways, it's cool because, you know, you know, now all of a sudden, you know, his. He can concentrate on what he's doing and he's happy and, you know, and we help him get more out to the, you know, the masses. So that part's been awesome for us. I mean, I get to watch these small businesses, you know, that people are starting up, you know, and, you know, friends of mine that, you know, I get to watch grow up through the industry and now all of a sudden we're helping them, you know, make their business bigger, you know, bigger and better. So Madden Weiss is another friend in Texas that, you know, just bought the muzzle company and he's a cool kid. You know, I've been friends with his dad forever. And, you know, he's, you know, we're, we distribute his muzzles, you know, across the company country too. So that's been another one of those deals. I, you know, we hope to keep in I guess as you ask, what's Rule Supplements going to do? That's one of the things we, I guess that will continue to do is pick up more of those people that are in the industry that are, you know, have small pro, you know, small, you know, one, one project kind of supplement projects or you know, show day supply projects. We're going continue to pick those up and help them get them out to the masses.
- [55:57]
It's time to recognize the other operations and businesses that have powered this episode.
- [56:02]
Mandy Fisher
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- [56:31]
Tyson Rule
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- [56:46]
Mandy Fisher
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- [57:07]
Tyson Rule
They are a company with dedicated full time folks who work hard to make you successful and they may be the only company in the country who can guarantee that their products are free of banned substances and biological contamination. They are serious about the stock show business and your success.
- [57:22]
Mandy Fisher
They offer supplements to feed through the entire feeding process and effective products to use while you are prepping your animals for show day.
- [57:32]
Tyson Rule
You can find them at over a thousand dealers across the United States or check them out at their website stockshowsecrets.com.
- [57:39]
Mandy Fisher
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- [57:55]
Tyson Rule
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- [58:09]
Mandy Fisher
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- [58:20]
Tyson Rule
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- [58:25]
Weston Hendricks
That is awesome. One thing that I think's funny is you mentioned will winners. He was episode two. Oh yeah, that's all right. Right now I've had about, I want to say, I want to give you the most accurate number. So hold on. We've had 94,567 people listen to that episode.
- [58:46]
Tyson Rule
That's awesome, dude. That's awesome.
- [58:48]
Weston Hendricks
And he talked about punch a little bit and I think it's crazy how cool that correlates. And I saw on Facebook, I think it was a week or two ago that Madden had bought Muzzle company. I thought that was the coolest thing ever because that kid has had insane amount of success and for him to stay in the industry a little bit after high school in his show career I think is one of the coolest things ever. But with all this said, I guess now what I really want to know is how do you think that you can give the best advice to people who are a first time customer, first time breeder, first time family and how you would tell them to start. What's, what's plan A? What, where do we go, you know.
- [59:36]
Tyson Rule
On the sheep side? That's real easy, you know, on the, you know, just, you know, find, find somebody that's being successful, you know, and go talk to them. You know, it's, it's a little nerve wracking. But you know, I love like, you know, young families that come up and, you know, hit us up after the backdrop and you know, like, hey, we watched you got, you know, like it was fun. You know, we went to the Black Hills Royals show and it was, you know, cool. My daughter Mackenzie had an awesome day. She won all three shows for the weekend. So, you know, it was awesome. We had a little kid come up afterwards and his family and wanted to talk, you know, for 30 minutes about, you know, what we do and how we do it and you know, I love that stuff. So, you know, I would say the first thing that, you know, on that side is just, you know, just don't be afraid to go up and talk to the guys that are successful. I mean, you know, we, you know, we've kind of done it all. I mean, to the point, you know, now where it's more fun for us to watch other people's, you know, be successful than it is really to, you know, go out winning a show ourselves. So, yeah, we, you know, I had three or four other little families that we've been helping. One of them, you know, was a, was a family that, you know, bought, you know, we had fourth overall with one of the sheep that we sold a family and kind of a second year family with us. And that was awesome. You know, that was almost more fun than my daughter winning. So, you know, those things are, you know, are really cool for me. So I think those new families, they just got to, you know, you can't be afraid to just go ask the guys that are being successful. I mean, if you, if you stay in your little, you know, in your, you know, stay in your bubble and just try to do it yourself, it's too hard. The other thing I'd say is, you know, be a little bit leery on Facebook. I mean, there's a whole bunch of, you know, I guess, experts on Facebook that, you know, on those group chats that, you know, they know everything, but there's not a lot of banners behind some of those success stories. So, you know, that's, I guess that's, that's my, I guess, word of caution. You know, I love those things and they do have some, you know, some valuable information, but I also see some of those answers and I just cringe. You know, I, I'd love to, you know, I'd love to answer. I like to just put something out there. But I also don't want to be that guy because, you know, I'm the, I'm the most non confrontational guy ever. I love being Switzerland, you know, and get along with everybody. But I, I also hate the fact that, you know, I, I hate seeing a family all of a sudden that get some advice. I'm like, that's the worst thing they could ever do on that deal. And, you know, so be careful. Like, I guess whenever you ask for advice on Facebook because sometimes that doesn't always give you the, you know, the, the expert on Facebook may not be the true expert.
- [61:51]
Weston Hendricks
So one of the things that I think's funny is people do that when it's just as easy to send a message out to someone like you or any other person that's had big success on messenger. I mean, it's, it's a lot easier to just do that. And I guess people are scared that they won't get an answer back or response. But what I've learned, and I was the same person two years ago, what I've learned is they'll respond. Just blow up their phone. It's not. It's not easy. I hate doing that because people are like, well, this kid's just annoying me. But.
- [62:26]
Tyson Rule
Yeah, what I tell you, I told you, hey, keep on hitting me up until I actually tell you I can do it. So, I mean.
- [62:30]
Weston Hendricks
Yeah, exactly.
- [62:31]
Tyson Rule
But just keep knocking it out. I'll get, you know, we'll get it knocked out sometime.
- [62:35]
Weston Hendricks
Yeah. And that's what I think. One thing that I'd like to tell people is like, just do it. Like, I know it's, like, scary, and it was scary for me to talk to you. I never met you before, but you're Tyson Rule, one of the biggest sheep guys in the industry. But anyway, it's not. It's not hard. Just text the people, like, if you have a question, they're going to answer. That's. I think the coolest thing ever, though, is being able to watch people grow and learn to find the big people in the industry and connect with them and learn to grow with them. So one thing I want to ask you, and we'll kind of wrap up the episode now, is a favorite quote or Bible scripture. You can do both. You can pick one. It don't matter to me, but I think it's something that pretty integral in these episodes.
- [63:20]
Tyson Rule
Oh, I got you. Hit me up with this. I was. I'm not prepared for it, so I can't remember what it was I was going to talk about. I guess one of mine was I actually listened to a guy named Alex Hermosi a bunch. He's an influencer online, and it's one of those ones that I love. I'm gonna try to remember how words it goes something with the fact like, no one gets the end of their life that says, I wish I would have played it safe, you know, we're all going to die, you know, so, you know, just don't let your, you know, dreams die with you. I guess that's the way I always look at it. Like, you know, I'm the guy, you know, we're, you know, you know, Amber and I, we had this discussion a lot of times. You know, we could, you know, we could have retired a couple years ago and just kind of, hey, you know, gone to shows with our kids and enjoyed our life, you know, and just kind of, you know, hey, how to get, you know, enjoyed, you know, you know, whatever we want to do at that point, you know, and just kind of, you know, kicked it and had a good life, you know, we're still, you know, we're still throwing all the, you know, we're still throwing the chips back in the table and, you know, betting it all on black, you know, and, like, we're building our site in Brownwood for the new repro center for the, you know, for real Sheep company. And, you know, we're going to have. Use that as a little bit of a distribution hub for rural supplements to kind of help us get more product down there a little more economically. And, you know, we're the worst guys are probably playing us safe because we, you know, you know, my banker, you know, that we. We have a good discussion that, you know, hey, diversification is great, you know, so that way, you know, they got plenty of, you know, plenty of ability to, you know, as long as you're, you know, as long as you're throwing the chips in in a safe manner, it still works. But, you know, you know, we. We like, you know, we like kind of, you know, going after it and kind of being. Being, you know, unique and, you know, I don't want to get the end of it and kind of being like, ah, you know, and I'm 60 years old or 70 years old saying, I wish I would have tried this or that. So we. We. We always kind of keep pushing on, and, you know, we've had some successes, and we've had a couple failures that, you know, didn't work out the way we wanted them to. But, you know, we just kind of go on and learn from those success, you know, some of those failures. And because of those failures, we've actually had some really good successes the next time because we learned, you know, what worked and what didn't work. So I think that's one of my. That's one of the things I always kind of try to keep on is, you know, you know, I don't want to look back and have regret that I didn't try something. So, you know, that's one of my favorite thought processes.
- [65:31]
Weston Hendricks
That's awesome. That's awesome. So I'm going to keep the. I've kept the question, I guess, for the last four seasons now everybody's like, are you going to ever, like, get rid of it? And. No, I'm not. I'm not going to get rid of it. So, Tyson, what I want to know is, what empowers you to be better than who you were before?
- [65:49]
Tyson Rule
You know, it's, you know, trying to leave something better than what, you know, than how I got it. So, like, my. I look at my. My grandparents, you know, and my grandpa, you know, he off the mountain as a poor, broke, you know, cowboy, you know, in the 55s, you know, and my dad was a dairy farmer who, you know, in theory, you know, was working at a feedlot and driving a truck and, you know, was in the army, you know, And I, you know, I was a copier salesman out of college, you know, who was going up and down the street, you know, eating bologna sandwiches and trying to save every penny he could to, you know, reinvest into, you know, into his dream, you know. And, you know, my goal is that, you know, my work ethic will go on to, you know, my kids and my son, my daughters and my son that, you know, they want to, you know, continue with whatever, you know, whether it's in the ag industry or our businesses or their own businesses and that they've. But they watched, you know, our businesses grow. And myself and, you know, my wife Amber, you know, what we do, and, you know, that, you know, our work ethic and our ability to treat people correctly and, you know, do the right things and build things the right way, you know, I guess they see those things happen and the people around us see those things happen that they want to, you know, continue to also do things to make them better than what they, you know, what they currently come out with. So.
- [67:02]
Weston Hendricks
Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Well, to wrap up the episode, I didn't forget this time, everyone. I got a Bible verse. That's one thing that we like to do is in the show or episode with the Bible verse. I think it's important to keep God in the middle of it because sometimes I lose sight. Obviously, I forgot an episode or, I mean, a scripture one episode, and I had, like, seven people blow up my phone. They're like, why did you not. I was like, I forgot. It was a long day. Okay, so I'm not this time. But it comes from us. From First John 4, 13, 14. It says, this is how we know that we live in him and he lives in us. He has given us his spirit. And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent His Son to be the savior of the world. I saw that this morning as a. As a. I think it was the daily verse or whatever. And what I got out of it was, no matter what, he does live in us, and if we disregard it, he'll show up somehow. And I think that's what I wrote down in my little notebook or whatever. But I don't know how it speaks to the people who listen, but I'm sure You needed to hear it because it came to me. So with all this said, Tyson, I do appreciate you coming on. It does mean a lot. I know you're a very busy person, so to take an hour with you and just talk about the industry means a lot. We give you the best blessings and condolences. From here on out. We'll always support Rule supplements. We know y' all will support us as well. You got anything else to wrap up the episode with?
- [68:31]
Tyson Rule
No, I appreciate all the time, too. Like I said, I wish you guys the best of luck. I mean, it's awesome to see new guys in the industry, you know, take on these roles. I mean, like, remember when JP first started his podcast, you know, and I'm, you know, I know he's busy now, and I wish he, you know, I wish you kind of roll back into it. And I'm glad you guys stepped up and, you know, knocking out because, like, you know, there's a. There's a big band for it and, like, there's guys, there's old guys like me that, you know, like, we need something to listen to and, you know, some excitement, you know, going on. So having you guys go out there and go talk, you know, talk and keep things rolling, I mean, is awesome. So we greatly appreciate it so more than you guys would ever know. So thank you, guys.
- [69:02]
Weston Hendricks
Absolutely. Well, this is empowering you with Tyson Rule. We'll see y' all next time.
- [69:11]
Tyson Rule
Make sure to check out our new and improved website@empoweryou podcast.org where you'll find the team's background, our sponsor stories and merchandise. But also check out our social media on Facebook and Instagram @empowerupod, where you'll find sneak peeks of episodes and their release dates, as well as sponsor recognition and much more. We are proud to have you as a listener on and hope you enjoyed.
- [69:34]
Weston Hendricks
Make sure to give us a five.
- [69:35]
Tyson Rule
Star rating and have a blessed day.