Putting the customer first is the business motto of Rapp Premium Genetics
ROCKVILLE, MO. – Chris and Reba Rapp already had a history in the cattle business before venturing off into the world of breeding. Both come from families that raised and sold registered Hereford and Angus cows.
But it wasn’t until after they got married in 2014 that they looked over the ranching landscape and saw a different path for themselves.
“When we got married we bought a few Angus cows and so we kind of got three breeds and we just kind of built it from there and we kind of had the idea that we would try to fill a void in our area,” Chris said. “There’s a lot of older breeders that are seed stock producers and there’s weren’t a lot of younger producers in our area at the time. So we thought maybe we could try to fill that need.”
Those first few breeds of cattle have blossomed into Rapp Premium Genetics. Located in Rockville (Mo.), the ranch has steadily grown and become a mainstay in the state.
But it hasn’t come without its hardships. Along with raising capital and funding the operation, just figuring out the marketing was a slow grind.
“The biggest struggle for us as far as business plan I guess would be the marketing and the customer base, trying to get people interested in trying something new,” Reba said. “Not that buying a bull is something new, but the face and the brand and the genetics are something new. We’re both technologically advanced enough to be dangerous and that’s about the extent of it. So marketing was kind of a learning curve for us and we’re still learning a lot of those things, but trying to learn how to navigate social media and things like that.”
According to the Rapps, the success of their gradual rise in the business is mostly due to customer service. Their belief in putting the customer first has been the main reason they have been able to survive even during the lean times.
“I feel like customer service is a big deal when it comes to stuff like this because there’s a lot of other people that have the same product we have, and so we try to do the best job we can as far as customer service,” Chris Rapp said. “When people get a bull that gets hurt, injured, dies, we try to get them a bull as quick and as fast as we can depending on the situation.”
According to Rapps, they go as far as to attach a guarantee with each sale, even if it may not be advantageous to their bottom line.
“We do offer a guarantee now. We didn’t the first couple of years because we just didn’t have the numbers to do that,” Reba said. “But now that we have a few more numbers, we do offer a guarantee and it’s kind of a peace of mind thing.”
It has taken the Rapps close to a decade to get to the point where they felt comfortable with their numbers to offer such guarantees.
Rapp Premium Genetics currently produces 25-30 head of cattle each year. They consist of Simmental and Sim Angus, Hereford and select Angus genetics.
“As of right now, I’m comfortable where we’re at because we kind of got about what we can comfortably run without putting ourselves in a bad position,” Chris said. “We’d like to have a few more, but we want to keep our quality where it is and as of right now. We usually have a few rollovers from season to season. We usually don’t sell bulls till they’re 18 months old, and so last fall, I think we started out with 34 and I think we got eight left that are going to be in our spring sale.”
The Rapps primary goal with Rapps Premium Genetics isn’t necessarily to get rich and retire. They are building something for the future that will outlast them.
“Honestly we are trying to build something for our kids,” said the Reba. “Land prices aren’t going down and they aren’t making any more of it. We weren’t going to be able to expand in size, so we’re going to have to do more with less. So we thought if we could start a business that we could grow and have kind of all the footwork done so when our kids get old enough to take over from us, it’ll already be up and running and all they got to do is continue to do a good job of what we’re doing and we’ll kind of maybe have the lean hungry years out of the way.”
While the Rapps hope to have the business running smoothing by the time their children are old enough to take over, they know there will still be issues they will have to deal with as owners that they weren’t prepared for. It was the same way with Chris and Reba when they first got started.
However, the Rapps plan to leave their kids with one most important lesson they have learned that will help guide the next generation’s decision-making.
“Don’t burn a bridge,” Reba offered. “It doesn’t need to be burnt because you might need to walk back across it.”
