New Faces and Opportunities in the South with Dakota Moyers and Webb Fields

Are you a producer in Texas or the southwest region? Join Webb Fields and Dakota Moyers as we discuss the team in Bryan, Texas and the opportunities for our cattle producers in Texas and surrounding states. Webb Fields serves as the Client Service Manager for the Bryan, Texas location. Dakota Moyers serves as the Regional Business Manager for the South. He searches for new business opportunities in his region and builds relationships with cattlemen. 

What states fall into the Southern region of Trans Ova?

Dakota: We just went through a modification here recently with the lab in Georgia coming online. So, the South now consists of Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico. It’s a pretty large area with a pretty dense population of cows – from the beef side of things and even in the dairy business.

What is the makeup of the CSR team for the South?

Webb: We had an old client from years ago recently call in, and he asked if one of the gentlemen that’s been here from the start was even still alive. That was certainly something we joked about, but at the same time I think it brings up a good scenario of yes, we’ve had a lot of movement, and generally it’s been people that have moved up and within the company, which is what is awesome about Trans Ova. We have a young staff and so that provides its challenges in some situations but provides a lot of opportunity as well.

What is exciting to me about our staff is having young, dedicated people on our team who want to do a really good job in their role and are always ready to go to bat for the client. In terms of who we’ve got in here specifically: we’ve got folks like JT Kelley who grew up in the show industry on the club calf side of things; folks like Annie Perez, who I think has the potential to be one of the best CSRs that we’ve had down here in terms of her want and will to get after it for her clients; Holly Perez who grew up in this industry and is cut from the same cloth and is serving clients out there in the direction where she grew up. We have Justin Rhodes, who schedules as many or more cows than anybody on our team is very much entrenched in the industry, specifically on the Indicus side; Savannah Dei who schedules a ton of cows at Clays and does a great job up there in Oklahoma. It’s a group of young people that are aggressive, that want to be successful, and that want to do a good job for their clients.

Who are some of Trans Ova’s satellite centers in the South?

Dakota: We’ve got a large group of satellites and satellite ownership that are awesome to work with. We’re always looking to add some new ones where it makes sense: we want to make this opportunity as convenient as possible for everybody. We’ve got locations in every state that we do some business in. I’m just going to highlight a few but you can find the whole list of them on the website.

We’ll talk about Clay’s, located in Perkins, Oklahoma. It’s probably the oldest satellite within the south region and the largest within our area. Bobby and Christina Clay do an awesome job up there. The professional service team and Savannah have done an incredible job to allow that business to grow.

We’re got another one in Oklahoma at Dustin Glover’s, and then we’re going to add one here this fall. There’s several out in the panhandle: We’ve got Muleshoe Animal Clinic and Bezner’s in Texline there to cover the clientele base out there. Here in central Texas, we have Blount’s Veterinary Services in Hamilton; it’s a unique situation because it’s managed by a Trans Ova employee, Dr. Joseph Blount, a young guy that’s very aggressive. There’s one in Arkansas at Triple 7 Farms in Magnolia that can service those clients. Down in Louisiana, we have Avoyelles in Mansura. In South Texas, they’re spread out and we’re always looking for new ones. But we have a great group of satellite owners that are conveniently located for folks to make it as easy as possible for clients to run cows and get the service that they need done.

Who offers donor housing in the South?

Dakota: There’s lots of locations that offer donor housing. Clay’s offers donor housing, Dustin Glovers in Elgin, Oklahoma offers a bit of donor housing, and Blount’s offers some donor housing. Some of our satellites like Bobby Clay’s will offer pregnant recips from time to time – depending on the availability. The Bryan location offers that as well. Depending on your location, I’d say reach out to the client service team. We’ll figure out what location is closest to you. If you need donor housing and that location doesn’t offer it, we’ll make some accommodation and find spots where it makes sense for you to go.

How do Trans Ova’s services impact the region and clientele?

Webb: I’ve seen the impact firsthand over the last 10 years or so, in terms of my affiliation as a Trans Ova client or in a role that utilized Trans Ova services, I’ve seen businesses pop up out of nowhere. Basically, taking one cow, multiplying that cow, taking her to different sires, honing in on a specific product and absolutely turning that into a huge and thriving business. I’ve seen that time and time again across multiple breeds.

And then specifically my family is affiliated with the Simmental breed. We started generating some Simbrah cattle and turned that into a business. That’s largely due to utilizing Trans Ova and getting the product that we need. I’ve seen it over and over again, and one of the most exciting things for me to be a part of this team is because I can see how life changing utilizing Trans Ova can be for people within this industry.

We’re seeing it on the commercial side too, in terms of utilizing ProGentus down here: huge groups of commercial cattle – that are half sibs to each other, full sibs to each other – that are extremely uniform and have a ton of quality. That’s a direct impact of Trans Ova.

What are the biggest areas of growth in the South for Trans Ova?

Dakota: I think the commercial clientele base is probably where we have the largest growth, both from a beef and dairy aspect. The ProGentus F1 embryos, the tiger stripe embryos, offer tremendous value to a large group of our clientele, both here in the South and the Southeast. As we dive further into it, I see the largest growth on the ProGentus side is the commercial dairy market. I come from a sister company, GENEX, so I spent a lot of time on commercial dairies, and I think there’s a large growth opportunity for our region to highlight those clients that we haven’t in the past and be able to work with them. Whether it’s through the terminal beef embryos that we offer through ProGentus, the Holstein/Jersey (hojo) embryos, or even just turning those clients into IVF customers that are making replacements. There’s a lot of growth opportunity within that dairy market that I spend a lot of time focusing on.

What are you excited for the South in the next one to five years at Trans Ova?

Dakota: There’s probably so many ways you could take that question. From the internal side of it, I think we’ve got an awesome team in place. I know there will obviously be changeover in the next five years, but I think there’s the right-minded people and that’s what was probably the most intriguing about joining the Trans Ova team. My mindset aligned well with the company’s vision of how to grow from an internal perspective, and how our representatives and our employees work with clients.

Even though it’s a little daunting, but exciting at the same time, we are going to start working to replace the business that went to the Georgia lab. It will allow us to be more aggressive towards some clients that in the past we’ve just maybe been tight on space and haven’t been able to be the most aggressive with.

There are also large commercial dairies within our region that I get very excited for on the feeder calf side of things with the terminal embryo. But I get really excited about that. I spend lots of time thinking about it and I spend lots of time talking to dairies about it. There are worlds of possibilities and a whole new set of clients that we’ve never imagined. In that world we could streamline some processes a little bit and make it easier on them.

Webb: It’s extremely exciting – where we can go. I’ve seen R&D stuff happening here at Trans Ova that we’ve implemented in terms of trying to make sure that conception rates are as good as they can possibly be. I really feel like Trans Ova is the absolute leader within this industry in terms of generating embryos that generate into a live animal that can be a product for our client base.

The leaps we can take internally to help drive the industry in a positive direction, I think are tremendous. I didn’t hear about beef on dairy five years ago, and now that’s all you hear. So, to think about five years down the road where this might be going and how Trans Ova is going to be a leader in that. I think from a commercial perspective, that’s the biggest ground to pick up. Providing a product that can allow clients to have large volumes of very uniform animals is something we can absolutely help with, and I’m excited to see that grow.

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