WHEN Andrew Down sold his family's dairy farm six years ago, he pledged to never sell to wholesale markets again.
As a vet and dairyfarmer, he had become disheartened with where the industry, and agriculture in general, was heading.
"Farms were either becoming large-scale corporate affairs or small organically certified enterprises," he said.
"The large farmers relied on export contracts or contracts with major retailers and they had poor environmental, animal welfare and employee welfare standards.
"Those that chose to stay small and turn to the organic niche markets also made sacrifices to animal welfare and the environment."
While he acknowledges this is a generalisation, he said that in between these extremes is a well-managed family farm which deeply cares about their natural resources, animals and employees and it is in this middle ground he has positioned his business Seaview Grove.
In 2010, Andrew and his wife Emily, a general practitioner, purchased 32.37 hectares at Currency Creek containing a 4-hectare olive grove.
They started production of high-quality extra-virgin olive oil supplying direct from the farm to local retailers and consumers.
With a strategy to produce locally grown food for local people, the Downs have added Lowline beef to their product range.
With Mr Down's background, adding meat made sense.
Being determined to only sell products direct to the consumer he wanted a product he was confident staking his name and reputation on.
"I had heard of Lowlines through family friends and my work as a vet, but when I finally got to taste one I was convinced this was the way to go," he said.
"It is also not a well-known breed among consumers, so the opportunity to offer something different was also appealing.
"There is a certain novelty aspect to first-time consumers of Lowline and this has helped us get started.
"Novelty is not a great long-term business plan though and fortunately the quality of the meat has exceeded all expectations of those who have been lucky enough to try it."
He said Lowlines were well suited to small area, having excellent feed efficiency allowing him to get more beef /ha than he could with many other breeds.
And the farm was blessed with a diverse mix of native pastures and feed is supplemented with lucerne hay.
"It has taken a while to fence the property and clear dead trees, dog rose and blackberry," Mr Down said.
"Now that we nearly have this sorted, we will start over-sowing clover into the native grasses."
The Lowlines are processed between 15 and 24 months of age at a dressed weight of 130 kilograms to 170kg.
Mr Down said his butcher was extremely pedantic and fastidious and believed it did not matter how good the cut was, if it was not well presented the customer would never taste it to find out.
"The beef is all organically grown, pasture-fed and well presented in cryovac packaging," he said.
"Our customers are all people looking for organic and ethically produced beef.
"They love being able to send me emails or call me to ask questions about how it is raised.
"Knowing where it comes from and how it is raised is certainly important, however, it's the quality of the meat that gets the repeat customers."
Mr Down said a customer who purchased a side earlier this year told him he had not come across a bad cut of Lowline.
"They can get quite fat though, so doing a good job of trimming any excess fat before it gets packaged is important," he said.
