Dairy Farmer of the Year Greg Dennis is striking a chord with consumers who can’t get enough of his non-homogenised, glass-bottled milk – and his sassy attitude.
Story By Heather Grant
Greg Dennis paces, watchful as a blue heeler, his eyes sweeping the dairy shed entrance. It’s a Saturday morning and Tamrook, his family’s 152-hectare dairy farm near Beaudesert, Qld, is hosting a farm tour. Ask any of the vintage car enthusiasts’ group members where they are and they’ll say, “Scenic Rim Robotic Dairy” meeting “Farmer Gregie”.
Australia’s Dairy Farmer of the Year is a nuggetty, ruddy-faced 45 year old, known to a growing legion of health-conscious grocery buyers in southern Queensland as Farmer Gregie, the man who dared to tear up a contract with the state’s major milk processor “because it wasn’t worth the paper it was written on”, and built a bottling facility to distribute his own pasteurised, unhomogenised milk – in glass bottles no less.
Greg’s engaging Facebook page has more than 11,000 followers. “Social media is just like another chore on the farm,” he says. “It takes time but it’s absolutely necessary. It’s all part of my belief in educating consumers. It also gives me somewhere to rant when I feel the need rather than bottling up frustrations.”
This story excerpt is from Issue #100
Outback Magazine: Apr/May 2015
