We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Brad & Jenna Batchelder . We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Brad & Jenna below.

Hi Brad & Jenna , thanks for joining us today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – walk us through the story?

Brad had the idea of buying land and starting a cattle business, much like what he lived on growing up. Our plan was different though, as we wanted to create a direct consumer product, selling sides and individual cuts of beef. It took us nearly three full years, but we finally found 118 acres just south of Belton, MO that we could envision starting our business and growing our family. This was a huge risk for us, as we had just had our first child, and put every penny we had into the start of this farm. The land we purchased had primarily been crop fields, so we had to convert everything to pasture and had to add all fencing. In addition to preparing the land for livestock, it also lacked housing, utilites, or barns. By the end of 2015, we decided to sell our house in town, building a barn with living quarters to be on our farm full time. In 2016, we sold and processed our first side of beef. From there we have grown our customer base and herd size each year. In addition to starting our initial cattle business, we decided to take on another risk and adventure. In June of 2023, we became the owners of the KC Buffalo Company, which had been previously owned by Peter Kohl for 30+ years. This new risk has lead to expanding our buisness knoweldge, now selling to a new customer base, as well as restuarants and stores. We now sell our beef and bison products at the City Rivermarket, online, and our storefront on our property.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Brad grew up on a cattle farm and wanted to continue the tradition of having a cattle business. We bought land in 2015, hoping to create a direct-to-consumer product, as we have always loved the notion of knowing what goes into our food and where our food comes from. In addition to our farm and our “regular jobs,” we have 4 children: Sawyer (9), Reese (7), Dean (5), and Owen (2) who help us care for our animals when they aren’t running us to a sporting event or other activities. We are most proud of our hard work and how we raise our beef, knowing we have a great product that is pastured raised without growth hormones or additives.

Let’s move on to buying businesses – can you talk to us about your experience with business acquisitions?

We just purchased the KC Buffalo Company in June of 2023, which was created by Peter Kohl over 30 years ago. Peter started raising grass-fed bison in the Kansas City area, selling to restaurants and stores and customers on his property’s store. Since taking over, we have started expanding the business, while keeping the same ideals of how the bison are raised.

How’d you meet your business partner?

Our business partner for KC Buffalo Company is our friend, Zak Elgin, who we met while Brad was teaching in the Belton School District.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.batchelderfamilyfarms.com and www.kcbuffalo.com
• Instagram: batchelderfamilyfarms and kcbuffaloco
• Facebook: Batchelder Family Farms or K.C. Buffalo Co
• Twitter: @BatchelderFarms and @KCBuffaloCo
• Youtube: Batchelder Family Farms