Chloe Brown, Renata Cumming and Lucy Collins have always had a passion for women and dairy and as a result, have been hosting networking events in western Victoria for the past two years.
In 2024 they decided to take it a step further, hosting their first out-of-region event.
Cream of the Crop was a two-day conference for women in the dairy industry, held in Echuca-Moama at the end of July.
The organisers were blown away by the support, with more than 110 people attending, the majority of whom were farmers.
“Women play such a huge role on-farm whether they are out physically working or doing the books, and often they do it all with a family in tow,” Ms Brown said.
“We wanted our program to have something for everyone from business through to networking and mental health. We were blown away with the sharing of different stories and the camaraderie.”
The conference included a variety of guest speakers, workshops, networking dinner and a regional tour including the GV Creamery, Mulcahys’ dairy operation and Byford Equipment.
“We had hoped for the best but at the same time we were apprehensive when we started planning because it is hard to get bums on seats, especially when we’re moving into a new region,” Ms Brown said.
She said it was great to see some faces from previous events but exciting to see so many new ones.
“Cream of the Crop is a positive initiative, and we want to collectively celebrate all the wonderful things about women and dairy and building off that positivity for the future of the industry.
“There was such a wonderful energy across the two days and the word of mouth feedback has been really encouraging.”
Murray Dairy chair Rachael Napier was a guest speaker and said it was her first time at the event. She will definitely be booking her ticket for the next one in Gippsland in 2025.
“I was so impressed by all the women in attendance who were all farmers,” Ms Napier said.
“It was such a supportive and amazing environment and it was the first event I have been too where it was organised by women and everything on offer was for women, including babysitting.
“The topics were all relevant and the tours were great. It was interesting to be shown around by a woman at Byfords who started her career on the floor welding.
“It was so easy to relate our own dairying journeys to her own personal experiences and it was so relatable, the whole conference was just amazing.”
Ms Brown said Gippsland had already been chose for the 2025 event, and it will now be all about finding the ideal time.
“We look at other dairy events and the region’s calving pattern and we always try to avoid those busy times so we can get as many people to attend as possible.”