Building better beef. That’s one goal of an innovative Kansas entrepreneur who is using a unique breed of cattle and careful quality control to create a remarkable beef-eating experience for consumers.
Dave Dreiling is the founder and owner of Booth Creek Wagyu. As we have previously profiled, Dave is a successful entrepreneur who studied business at K-State. He met and married Kristen Spaeth. Dave founded GTM, the sportswear company, and also owns numerous restaurants.
In 2008, he bought a Pottawatomie County ranch, primarily for deer hunting. Through the years, he expanded the property, now known as Booth Creek Ranch. Meanwhile, Dareiling’s uncle raised greyhounds near Abilene and had started raising beef cattle as well, including some cows that had been bred to a bull from a Japanese breed known as Wagyu.
“We got some of this beef and fell in love with it,” Dreiling said. They found it to be especially tender and flavorful. Dreiling went to his uncle’s dispersal sale with the intention of buying one animal, but ended up purchasing four full-blood Wagyu and 28 Wagyu embryos. “My intent was to buy a few head to have great beef for family and friends,” he said.
The more Dreiling learned about Wagyu, the more he became convinced about the potential of the breed and the opportunities to upgrade beef consumption. “There aren’t a lot of Wagyu producers,” he said. “One was a cattle company in California that was shipping them to Kansas to be fed, and then shipping them back to be processed.”
“Kansas is a better place to raise cattle,” Dreiling said. “Why couldn’t we do this here, all the way through?” Continue reading “Dave Dreiling, Booth Creek Wagyu”
