Consumers rely on experience and credence attributes when purchasing beef from retailers. It is essential for all beef industry sectors to recognize the complexity of consumer buying behavior. A hedonic model is estimated to determine if there are incentives to brand beef steaks, the types of...

Cattle feeders want feeder cattle that have been weaned and preconditioned with a certified health program. Preconditioned calves perform more efficiently in the feedlot with lower morbidity and mortality. Health program claims, however, range from no claim to being USDA-certified. The value of...

Geographic fed cattle markets are important because cattle are bulky and perishable, and production and consumption areas are separated. These characteristics make cattle transportation costly and can contribute to segmented markets. This study uses USDA-AMS reported fed cattle market price data...

Considerable efforts have been made to provide cow-calf producers with information to help them make informed decisions about adding value to calves. Despite demonstrated market incentives to retain calves, many producers still sell right after weaning. We postulate this observed behavior is...

Grid pricing is one of the beef industry's answers to improving value coordination in fed cattle transactions. This paper constructs individual carcass-level grid and wholesale beef values. These values are used to evaluate the level of value communication that occurs between wholesale and grid...