Oct 18, 2017Hasenoehrl to focus on promoting the Idaho brand
Mary Hasenoehrl was appointed to the Idaho Potato Commission (IPC) last month and looking ahead on her time on the commission, she is focused on promoting Idaho potatoes to consumers.
“We need to keep that Idaho brand, that Idaho quality out in front of people,” she said, adding the IPC needs to, “keep our eye on that mission, letting people know that Idaho potatoes are the best.”
Toward that goal, she believes she has information and perspectives that can help.
“I think because we are the target market, females do the shopping,” she said. “When we’re shopping we want make sure we get our money’s worth and we get that quality.”
Hasenoehrl is the second woman on the commission, joining Peggy Arnzen of the Bench Mark Potato Company. However, she is the first female member of the board who is also a grower, and the IPC believes she brings a wealth of agriculture experience to the commission.
Hasenoehrl runs Gross farms with her husband and business partner Doug Gross. She runs another farm that raises native grasses and is also a partner in a company that raises and blends native grass seed. She started her agriculture career back in 1974 with FFA (Future Farmers of America). Hasenoehrl rose to statewide FFA office and since then has been involved in many ag organizations. Most recently, she’s served as a commissioner for the port of Lewiston, Idaho.
During her time with the port, she has had to deal with issues like dredging to keep berths deep enough to accommodate barges and dealing with turmoil in Portland, Oregon which made it difficult for the port to accept containers from Lewiston.
Her view that it’s essential to have a variety of voices, and therefore ideas, was reinforced by dealing with those issues.
“It’s the same thing,” she said. “People come together with different perspectives, whose ideas are different.”
