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Feeders, Packers and Industry Leaders

Lee Borck and the Beef Marketing Group: Pooling Cattle to Gain Bargaining Power

A loan officer turned feedlot owner who organized small Kansas feeders into a cooperative and built a data-driven link to the meat case.

Who Is Lee Borck?

Lee Borck is a Kansas cattle feeder and banker best known for the Beef Marketing Group, a cooperative of feedyards. The Cattle Feeders Hall of Fame biography says he is based in Great Bend and chairs both the Beef Marketing Group and Innovative Livestock Services, Inc., and credits him with developing an approach to meeting retail customers' needs by aligning producers with the meat case. The Hall inducted him in 2011.

He is a native of Blue Rapids, Kansas, and lives in Manhattan, Kansas, according to the Great Bend Tribune.

From Blue Rapids to the Loan Desk

Borck grew up on the family homestead near Blue Rapids. A Drovers profile says his father farmed through the Great Depression and was conservative, and Borck considers him the best businessman he knew. He earned a degree in agricultural economics from Kansas State University in 1970.

His first job was as a loan officer with the Production Credit Association in Larned, where he stayed eight years. Lending gave him a close look at feeders' margins, which shaped the way he later ran feedlots.

Buying Into Ward Feedlot in 1978

Borck bought into Ward Feedlot in Larned in 1978. Drovers reports interest rates reached 18% in those years, and that he grew through many small deals while facing a 50-cent regional discount compared with western Kansas cattle.

That discount is the problem the later cooperative was designed to address. Feeders in central Kansas were selling cattle at lower prices than the big western Kansas yards, and each yard was too small to bargain alone.

Organizing the Beef Marketing Group in 1988

In 1988 Borck organized several area feedlots into The Beef Marketing Group, a cooperative. The members had little capital, so they pooled cattle to negotiate better prices. That year, Excel, a Cargill forerunner, paid 50 cents per hundredweight above the western Kansas price for 50,000 Holsteins. Critics called the group the cartel.

In 1993 members began sharing packer bids by fax. The cooperative developed a marketing relationship with IBP, now Tyson, that remained in effect at the time of the Drovers article, using other packers' cash bids as a base.

Data and the Meat Case

The IBP arrangement gave the group the right to harvest data on all of its cattle. Drovers says the group's first 500,000 carcass and closeout records became the foundation of Vet Life's Benchmark program.

Drovers reported benchmark gains from about 3 pounds a day at a 6.2 feed conversion to nearly 4 pounds a day at 5.6. Cost of gain still varied from 75 to 80 cents across pens. The Hall of Fame bio describes the broader idea as aligning producers with retail customers, and the Great Bend Tribune says his yards aim to meet consumer demand through accountability in food safety, animal care and sustainable production.

The Key to Borck's Success

Borck's record shows a banker's habits applied to feeding: know the numbers, pool risk, and share information. Small yards joined forces to get the pricing power of a large one.

There were costs and criticism. Drovers notes that critics called the group the cartel, and thin capital in the early years limited what members could do alone.

  • Started as a loan officer, giving him a view of cost of gain and margins before he owned a yard.
  • Grew through many small deals in the high-interest years around 1978.
  • Pooled cattle from several feedlots in 1988 to gain bargaining power with packers.
  • Shared bids among members from 1993 so each yard saw the market.
  • Used carcass and closeout data to benchmark gain, conversion and cost.

Honors and Service

Borck was named an Alumni Fellow in the Kansas State College of Agriculture in 1995, and Ingram's listed him among 50 Kansans You Should Know. He is a past president of CattleFax and the Kansas Livestock Association and has served on the Cattlemen's Beef Board. He chaired the Kansas State University Foundation board of trustees and is chairman and founding shareholder of American State Bank of Great Bend. Agriculture news outlets reported he was named Kansas Stockman of the Year in 2014, and he received the 2017 Industry Achievement Award from the Feeding Quality Forum, which called him a master of ag finance.

For more cattle business history, visit farm.FM's ranching section or read a farm.FM story about a Kansas cattle cooperative.

Timeline

  1. 1970Graduates from Kansas State University in agricultural economics.
  2. 1978Buys into Ward Feedlot in Larned, Kansas.
  3. 1988Organizes several feedlots into The Beef Marketing Group cooperative.
  4. 1993Members begin sharing packer bids by fax.
  5. 1995Named an Alumni Fellow in the Kansas State College of Agriculture.
  6. 2011Inducted into the Cattle Feeders Hall of Fame.
  7. 2014Named Kansas Stockman of the Year, per news reports.
  8. 2017Receives the Feeding Quality Forum Industry Achievement Award.

Frequently asked questions

Who is Lee Borck?

Lee Borck is a Kansas cattle feeder and banker who organized the Beef Marketing Group cooperative in 1988 and chairs Innovative Livestock Services. He is based in Great Bend and was inducted into the Cattle Feeders Hall of Fame in 2011.

What is the Beef Marketing Group?

The Beef Marketing Group is a cooperative of feedlots organized by Borck in 1988. Members pool cattle to negotiate with packers and share data on gain, feed conversion and carcass results.

When was Lee Borck inducted into the Cattle Feeders Hall of Fame?

Borck entered the Cattle Feeders Hall of Fame in 2011. The Great Bend Tribune reported the induction took place in Denver on June 30.

Sources and further reading

Profiles are compiled from public sources and reviewed against them. See our editorial policy to suggest a correction.

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