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Nice to Meat Ya: David Livingston

I wanted to know more about the man behind the TIPS curtain at Certified Angus Beef LLC (CAB). TIPS is the Trademark Integrity Protection System created by CAB senior vice president Brent Eichar when he was practically a kid in 1988. It was officially named the year after a new master took over its management in January 1999.

DSC_0198Since then, TIPS has grown to billions of data points, more complex yet more helpful every day. Not unlike its master, David Livingston.

He grew up near Wooster, Ohio, but went to college in the 1980s in Ashland, Wis., to study biology and chemistry and keep playing soccer. Returning to the Buckeye State, he served as camp instructor for the National Wildlife Federation and another outdoor education center, then as an animal rehabilitation coordinator, nursing native wildlife back to health and a return to the wild. “We saw all kinds of baby rabbits and raccoons, as well as hawks, eagles and turkey buzzards…those kinds of things.”

OK, but how will this ever lead to CAB? When he got married, David and his wife decided to move closer to their families and start their own. SO, the job at CAB, right? Not yet. In fact, why would we ever expect to meet him at this stage?

For seven years, David put his biology degree to a new use doing toxicology studies at a research lab in Ashland, Ohio. By then, he was supervising seven other technicians and running to keep up with twin boys and their older brother.

with boys in NewMexLab work presented his first chance to write a computer program for an employer, to monitor those toxicology tests. “Sure, I’d played with computers – such as they were back then – writing programs on my own, for fun and enjoyment.”

There was a “glass ceiling” at the lab for anyone trying to advance with no doctorate degree, and then he saw a want ad for a programmer at CAB….there was nothing in his resume that supported the notion, “but I knew I could do it.”

Perhaps it helped that the one-on-one with Eichar found the two are “wired the same way.” Brent had no computer training either, when he decided to create the relational database that became TIPS.

Both sides took a leap of faith that has proven a win-win. Lateral, logical thinking fits well with running the complex graphical user interface that is TIPS. When focus is required, David is a laser. But clearly his mind ranges far afield to consider what is coming down the pike and how to adjust.

running relay for life 100That’s actually how he got into running (yes, for fun and enjoyment), up to 2,000 miles per year, with 50 marathon races and three 100-mile runs under his belt.

But at CAB his job is running TIPS, maintaining and improving it. The 17,000 partners around the world file regular reports, 97% electronically but some on paper (that was the other way around in 1999), and TIPS ensures it all adds up to “product ordered equals product sold.”

That’s how the world knows when they buy this brand at retail or in the restaurant, they can be sure it really is CAB and they can look forward to that dependable eating experience. But TIPS has grown to do much more as it gathers its billions of entries – no small feat in itself.

“You can have all the data in the world,” David notes, “but unless there’s some way to access it in a format that makes sense, it doesn’t do any good.”

David responds to scores of requests from “our creative staff” to further customize reports each year. There are at least 50 basic reports from feedlot data to beef cuts per carcass weight to seasonal patterns of sales movement, and each of those has dozens of options.

Account managers study numbers and ask what if. For example, they find price patterns for cuts their partner licensees want and help them buy when it costs less, thus adding more value to Angus cattle in contraseasonal ways.

Why? Knowledge is power. The kind of power that can eventually add to your bottom line.

~Steve

PS–Want to read this whole series? Here are the links:

 

 

 

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