By Eric Jenks, Special to NEAFA
For July, NEAFA spoke with Katelynn Robbins, the Account Manager for the East Coast at Arm & Hammer Animal Nutrition for the past three and a half years. “We are a gut health and nutritional company,” said Robbins. “We focus on pro and pre-biotics. On the nutritional side, we do rations for positive and negative DCAD (Dietary Cation-Anion Difference). The Animal Division at Arm & Hammer is over 80 years old now. All of our products are made domestically, which is a good bonus given the tariff war recently. Our products are sold throughout the US, Mexico, and Canada. We do ship overseas, which can sometimes be challenging given the current economic landscape. We are a lean team for our department, with ten of us making up the Eastern and Western areas. Six of us cover east of the Mississippi, the other four cover the west. The work is extremely rewarding. When I get a call from a consultant or producer saying that the audits that we’ve done has increased milk or lessened losses, it’s wonderful. As long as our customers are financially stable and stay in the business as long as possible, we all win at the end of the day.”
Robbins grew up on a dairy in Millterton, PA, where she lives today. “I’m back on the home farm,” said Robbins. “Though we sold the dairy portion in 2011. I went to SUNY Morrisville, where I received an Associate degree in Dairy Science, and then a Bachelors in Ag Business. Having my own dairy, I didn’t realize that there were positions like my current job until I was headhunted for by another company, and I’ve now been in sales for fourteen years. I love supporting our producers. It’s always a different challenge every day, collecting data and helping clients make economic choices. Every dairy is so very different. The real icing on the cake is building all the relationships for our nutritionists with our clients, I really enjoy those connections.”
Robbins became involved with NEAFA approximately a decade ago. “A friend of mine that works in the industry, Danielle Penney-Stroop (former NEAFA President), she told me that it would be great get involved with NEAFA, and she was right,” said Robbins. “The amount of time that board members spend on the organization and its members is remarkable. The community and the brainstorming for the industry is wonderful. We’re all competitors at some point. But being able to come, sit down together, have good meetings, and build good relationships and bonds with these folks while learning and understanding state laws is so important. You can think that legislation doesn’t affect us on the day to day, but it really does. Organizations like NEAFA are important in keeping on top of it all, and making sure our voice is heard when legislation is being discussed.”
For more information on Arm & Hammer Animal Nutrition, you can call Robbins directly at (570) 707-8421, or visit https://ahanimalnutrition.com/