How to Become a Barn Manager
One route that can prepare someone to become a barn manager leads to Delaware Valley Agricultural College. This College in Doylestown, Pennsylvania has recently received a grant from the U.S. government. It is poised to acquaint any student with the latest agricultural advances.
Knowledge of recent agricultural advances should be sought by anyone wanting to become a barn manager. At the College in Doylestown, students studying the management courses learn how to design effective marketing communication. They learn how a barn manager can best acquaint the public with the latest agricultural techniques.
A failure to achieve good communications created problems for the agricultural industry in Europe. There, consumers were afraid to eat foods developed with genetic engineering techniques. Students at the Pennsylvania College learn how to prevent such a widespread refusal to use the foods developed with the latest agricultural techniques.
Any student intent on becoming a barn manager must also learn other management basics. That student must learn how to distribute any product that is stored in a barn. The barn is like a warehouse, and the barn manager must move the product from the “warehouse” into the retail setting.
The student who wants to become a barn manager must strive for an understanding of basic economics. The barn manager needs to determine the price that the retailers will have to pay for the goods that they get from the barn. The barn manager must become aware of consumer behavior, so that the quoted price represents a realistic price.
The barn manager must learn all of the policy and regulations that relate to the product that will be stored or raised in the barn. For example, if the barn is to house chickens, then the barn manager must learn as much as possible about bird flu. That barn manager would need to be prepared to follow any government directives regarding the containment of a case of bird flu among the birds in any barn.
These are the sort of things that are taught at Delaware Valley Agricultural College. The College shows the future barn manager that management is both a science and an art. The future barn manager learns how to be both a scientist and an artist.
Few of the students who study to become a barn manager live on campus. Most rent rooms in the community of Doylestown. One widow living in Doylestown in the late 1970s rented a bedroom to a student from Delaware Valley Agricultural College. That young man later entered a veterinary school on an island in the Bahamas.
Although that young man did not go on to become a barn manager, he did demonstrate the good conduct of the College students. The widow, who had never had a son, had no complaints about his behavior. His behavior emphasized the quality of the students at the College, including any of the students who want to become a barn manager. The lucky farmers around Doylestown enjoy the privilege of hiring any graduating student who aspires to become a barn manager.
