#4 - Driving Positive Change in the Animal Care Industry

Prepare to be inspired as we sit down with Nona Nesseth, a veteran in the animal health industry with over two decades under her belt. Her infectious passion is evident as she opens up about her journey in everything from dentistry to cardiology and even pharmaceutical products. As an advocate for the fear-free initiative and a devoted volunteer for the Minnesota Veterinary Medical Foundation, Nona's commitment to enhancing animal care is truly commendable.

Immerse yourself in an insightful conversation as we unpack the nitty-gritty of implementing change in veterinary practice – think staff buy-in, cultivating a united team vision, and other effective strategies to keep the whole team pulling in one direction. We then delve into the heartwarming work done by the Minnesota Veterinary Medical Foundation, touching on scholarships, grants, and community events that play a pivotal role in supporting the veterinary community. Finally, gear up for a sneak peek into the much-anticipated vet gala, complete with a masquerade-style costume party and abundant fundraising opportunities for a good cause. This episode is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone in the animal care industry, courtesy of the incredible Nona Nesseth.

Guest Info:
 
Nona Nesseth – Contact Information

elanco.com/en-us 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/nona-nesseth-582b0ba

nona.nesseth@elancoah.com

Host Information

Bill Buter – Contact Information

Direct – 952-208-7220

https://butlervetinsurance.com/

bill@butlervetinsurance.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/billbutler-cic/

Schedule a Strategy Session with Bill – Strategy Session

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Communication is the number one key. That maybe causes a downfall or cripples some practices from making a change.

Speaker 2: 0:17

Welcome to the Veterinary Blueprint podcast brought to you by Butler Vet Insurance. Hosted by Bill Butler, the Veterinary Blueprint podcast is for veterinarians and practice managers who are looking to learn about working on their practice instead of in their practice. Each episode we will bring you successful, proven blueprints from others, both inside and outside the veterinary industry. Welcome to today's episode.

Speaker 3: 0:42

Welcome to the Veterinary Blueprint podcast. I'm your host, Bill Butler. On the Veterinary Blueprint podcast, we discuss business success and entrepreneurship for the veterinary industry. Joining us today in this episode is Nona Nesseth, a seasoned professional in animal health with over two decades of expertise, From dentistry to cardiology, pharmaceutical products and her advocacy for the fear-free initiative. Nona's depth in the field is very profound. I'm so glad she's joining us today and, beyond her vast experience, she's extremely passionate about the welfare of our four-legged friends and the professionals who care for them. On a personal note, her and I connected with. One of her serious passions and notable contributions is her generous work with the Minnesota Veterinary Medical Foundation, which she's been participating in for at least the last decade, and it just really exemplifies her spirit of giving back to the industry and we're thrilled to have you today. Welcome, Nona.

Speaker 1: 1:40

Thanks a lot, bill. That intro is very kind. I expect a little theme song to play right now, or something.

Speaker 3: 1:49

Some cheering music. Maybe we'll throw that in the notes when it's edited out. Well, thanks for joining us today. I'm very glad that you're on the podcast because I think just you have so much expertise and experience just beyond what you do in the pharmaceutical realm and you can share some of those insights with our listeners today. But if people are meeting you for the first time, why don't you share a little bit about who you are and your background and what you love about animal health and how you wound up as a senior rep with executive rep with Alonco?

Speaker 1: 2:22

Thanks, Bill.

Speaker 1: 2:25

I think that I always say that God bless the broken road because I had degrees in computer science and music. I spent a decade as an apparel buyer for a group of ski shops and I think that the thing that veterinarians or people in this industry hate to hear is like, why did you come? And it's like because I love animals. And the reality is I was looking to make a career change and sales just comes very natural to me. Pharmaceuticals, like. I like the blend of science and relationships.

Speaker 1: 3:06

And someone said, oh, but no, no, you like animals, right? I know someone who's interviewing people for veterinary pharmaceuticals and you know, like I guess had anybody said that if you created a dream job, this would be it. But it really kind of happened by happenstance and I still have dreams 24 years later that worried that this might not work out and I'd have to go back to my old job. I clearly am so blessed to be able to work in this field and to combine things that are all passions, like I have a Weimar honor who is like the center of our family. I have a husband and two beautiful daughters, and I do think that I think the passion is a word that just kind of like embodies the way that I like to live life. Like I love giving back, I probably get as excited about raising money for a common cause that we have.

Speaker 1: 4:18

As much as I do love spending some time in basketball bleachers and supporting my girls, who are also jealous so kind of a hodgepodge of things that fill my bucket.

Speaker 3: 4:32

I know that as we've connected over the last couple years, your passion comes through and the the veterinarians who work with you and your work at Alonco are very loyal to you and passion comes through. I remember we were setting up for the. You know I speak about your husband and your daughters. We were setting up and our booth happened to be next year booth at the NVMA convention, last year Minnesota Veterinary Medical Association convention, and your husband was there helping set up because you had some out of town commitments for Alonco and I thought, man, how do I get, how do we get my spouse to come set my booth up? We'll have to figure that out for next year, but I've had the chance to opportunity to meet your husband a couple of times and it is kind of a family affair.

Speaker 3: 5:14

Everyone's passionate about what you do. So tell us about your role at Alonco and what you're currently doing here in the state of Minnesota and upper Midwest with Alonco, kind of having done a number of different roles throughout the upper Midwest and different companies. Tell us about what you're doing right now at Alonco and how you're interacting with veterinary practices.

Speaker 1: 5:36

Sure. So I have a career in the veterinary field that's span 24 years. I've worked for a variety of different pharmaceutical companies. I've spent five years as a regional manager for a distribution company, but I think for me I'm so passionate, I love that one-on-one connection. I love being in veterinary hospitals. I like talking about medicine, I like making a difference that I feel saves animals lives. So I've been with Alonco for about two years and I cover a territory, pretty much the Twin Cities metro area and into southern Minnesota. My therapies or the drugs that I primarily promote are vaccines, immunology, paracetamides, therapeutics from anywhere from diabetes to pain management and a whole host of things. And I do like. When my kids were little they would say you know, like a daycare, what does your dad do for a living? And he does work, work. And what does your mom do? She saves dogs and kitties lives. So I like to believe that I am saving dogs and kitties lives in some small part.

Speaker 3: 7:05

Absolutely Well, I know that. You know you're very passionate when you go through. You know I think for us, you know for myself, I'm not in the medical sphere of veterinary, the veterinary industry, more of the business side. But you know, when I look at the whole host of different pharmaceutical companies, I think they all kind of run together for me as, like you know, hardware medicine is hardware medicine and one company is this, one company is that, and I think that was why one of the reasons I wanted to bring you on today, known as just, you know, if you're a veterinary practice and you've got you know name a pharmaceutical manufacturer.

Speaker 3: 7:43

There are a number of big ones out there. Alonco is one of them. You know how do veterinarians kind of cut through that noise? The vendors are coming to the door all the time. They're, you know they're trying to set appointments. I get it with the insurance companies, right. So we represent insurance companies and I've got you know travelers coming to my door and Hartford coming to my door and they all want me to sell their product over something else and it's like well, workers' compensation insurance is workers' compensation insurance. So how do you handle that information and sales tactics If you're going to give a couple tips for a veterinary practice manager or owner to kind of cut through some of that noise on the relationships that they develop. What are some things that you would recommend to them?

Speaker 1: 8:22

That's a big concern. I think, bill, that I've heard many times over the years and you know, I think, that I always say would you buy a medication, would you personally take a medication off of a commercial that you've seen on TV? And I think most people would say no, that we wouldn't base a decision strictly based on actors running through a field with daisies. You know we want to get down to the nitty gritty and it's valuable to meet with your veterinary sales professionals and ask questions about products during a product detail, listen to the information that's being shared by the sales representative or the company employee, but then do your due diligence and read product inserts, attend webinars, listen to podcasts with veterinary experts, request staff education for the team, and I think you know it's changed a lot in the past 25 years. There used to be a lot of swanky dinner meetings where you'd go and get information, and I think that you know work-life balance has changed a lot. Of that People don't necessarily want to do the evening stuff, yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:51

And so I think things have changed so much. But we also have so many more avenues to get information. Webinars are available live so that maybe there's an industry expert that wouldn't fly to your location but you can hear from that industry expert live, you can ask questions. So you've got live webinars. You've got on-demand offerings so you can hear more in-depth things and you can do it from the comfort of your home and your pajamas at any time of day or night that's convenient for you.

Speaker 1: 10:32

Again, do your due diligence. A product insert is really valuable and it highlights the prescribing information, indications and usage, dosage and information, dosage forms, counter-indications, warnings and so forth. But read those and then ask questions about it, because I think that you know, if we go in and detail a product, it's kind of like being at a job interview. You share your highlights and your best points and I worked with a veterinarian who had a great saying that like if you're not the first one in the door or you're not the first product, it's kind of like asking a pretty girl to prom If you're not the first one you better either have a shinier car or a prettier croissage.

Speaker 3: 11:27

That's right. Having launched this podcast, looking at other podcasts that are out there, you know, just talking about webinars, I mean this. If you look just to talk about another podcast I see offer a ton of information, like vet curl, like every other week they've got, you know, somebody on talking about something and a lot of it is that companion animal care, which I know is a passion for you. So you know, in the insurance world there's so much information out there and there's no shortage of it. Where you know, I've been in the insurance industry 20 years now and so you just have to read the once a month magazine put out by the National Association to say, hey, this is the information that's out there. There really wasn't anywhere to get that information. And now there's podcasts, there's there's actually three national events going on this month.

Speaker 3: 12:15

So you know, it seems that there's no shortage of information. So what I'm hearing you say is kind of be a curious practice owner and ask a lot of questions. And then it's also, I think probably you know it's a relationship business and you know the insurance is a relationship business. I think that pharmaceutical rep role and what you do is also a relationship business and you'd probably agree with me that having a very good relationship with your rep, whoever that is, helps cut down some of that. Am I getting sold, or are they really looking out for my best interests as a practice?

Speaker 1: 12:48

Yeah, I think that's one reason why this is such an amazing field is that the relationships are still paramount. It's really important. Do you trust this person? Do they bring value to your practice? You know that. Do they? Do they support new product exploration? Do they support our industry? Because it's not.

Speaker 1: 13:16

It's not a nine to five job where you show up and then you go home at night Like and I think you're a prime example too that you know you don't just sell insurance, you're really invested in this profession and ensure that this profession isn't just healthy today, but you know, In the in the future.

Speaker 3: 13:40

yeah, tell me a little bit about. Just as somebody who doesn't isn't in a practice every day, how many different. So if I'm, if I'm opening a practice tomorrow, let's say for a new, new veterinarian, let's say I'm an associate, I'm working at a practice and I've never had to be a buyer before, I've never had to deal with that buyer relationship. But you know, these are just the products that we have on the shelf, that are the tools in the toolbox.

Speaker 3: 14:05

If I'm an associate at a practice and let's say I'm going to open a practice or take over a practice, and now I'm the one navigating these relationships for the first time, what are some things I need to think about? Because if, if I'm sure, just like other industries, if I open or I say hey, I'm opening a practice, I'm now on the radar for BI Alonco, you know, and all the dog food companies, all the pharmaceutical companies, they're all going to be coming at me saying, hey, you should be, you should be repping our products, not their products. So these are why our products are top of the line. And so what should I? Kind of have one or two things in my mind when I, when I'm looking to develop a relationship with a pharmaceutical rep.

Speaker 1: 14:45

That that's. That's a great question and and I think trust is a is probably your great starting point. Who do you trust? What's the best fit for my practice, like, do I like to buy in bulk and get this great deal, or do I really want to buy just as I need it? And and what kind of programs are in place? Because there's, there's the, you know it's got to be the right product. It's kind of like if company X comes in and says I have the best product that kills purple worms and you go, that's amazing.

Speaker 1: 15:32

But are purple worms anything that is pertinent to your practice?

Speaker 1: 15:37

You know you've got to make sure that it matches the vision of your own practice, that it's something that your, your clients want.

Speaker 1: 15:50

You need to make sure that it's something that your whole staff has buy in for and and there are some benefits in supporting, you know, one or two vendors by all means. It's so funny because when I was a regional manager, I had an employee who was on my team and he had been in the field for 42 years and he was so well respected, he was just, he had so much integrity and I said you know what has happened. What do you think the biggest changes are that have happened over the years. And he thought for a second and he said you know, I think a lot of it is that the length of time that it takes to integrate something into your practice. He said you know, years ago I would meet with a veterinarian on Monday and I would tell him about a new product and he'd say send me 12 of those. And on Tuesday he would get 12 of those and he would be prescribing it to a patient on Tuesday afternoon.

Speaker 3: 17:01

Sure.

Speaker 1: 17:02

Today it might take a year and I think you know like getting staff buy-in and getting educating your team, sharing why something is important, why we've made this decision, how is this different than something we've done or bought before? Get buy-in from the staff. You know do pricing comparisons. It's an arduous process.

Speaker 3: 17:32

So you know, let's say I've been in business for a year now. I've developed that relationship. I have trust. I trust you, nona, you're my, you're our rep and you come at us with a new product and it replaces an old product or whatever it might be in the practice, and it doesn't even have to be you know pharmaceutical related potentially. But just you know from your 20 plus year experience in the industry what when you make a decision at the hospitals you just said it takes a long time to implement some of these decisions. So what strategies have you seen in the practices you've worked with over the last 20 years that are successful to get everyone on board and follow through with the plan, say, okay, we're gonna change pharmaceutical product or we're gonna change the direction of what we're doing. How do we get that? You know from your experience. How do you see the successful practice implement those changes?

Speaker 1: 18:22

First of all, I would probably say change is one of the most painful things in a veterinary hospital and they'll go.

Speaker 1: 18:32

We've always done it this way and I remind them that they also maybe used to use halothane, which is, you know, an anesthetic agent, and at some point in time you need to recognize that change is not a bad thing. Change is good for the practice, but I think communication is the number one key that maybe causes a downfall or cripples some practices from making a change. So, you know, make the decision, create a plan, educate your staff, communicate the why, communicate the benefits, have your rep come in and help train and educate the staff why this is a good thing, why they made this decision. And I think everything needs to go back to how does this affect the client and how does it affect the patient, the pet? What makes it better for the end user?

Speaker 3: 19:38

Yeah, I think that communication thing is critical because in my background, prior to the insurance industry, I was in the military and one of the things that we always talked about was everyone has to know where you're going and what you're doing. Because if you're the bottom private at the end of the line or end of the patrol or whatever, you have to know what the entire mission plan is, just like you're the lieutenant or the platoon sergeant and the squad leader. So that way, in the absence of leadership, you know which direction you're going and what can be done. And so I think that communication thing and regardless of industry or what the actual, you know the intent of what the change is, communicating it to the team so that you can get the buy-in there might be some reluctance and there might be a few holdouts who still say that well, we always have done it this way. But if you can get the whole herd kind of going in one direction, that helps the outliers, because you may not get everyone but you need to get most people. And yeah, the communication piece and the benefits, why? So, just thinking about that a little bit further, we do a team huddle every day at Butler Vet Insurance.

Speaker 3: 20:46

Now that might not be practical for a veterinary practice or clinic, but how critical do you see? You know that. I know practices that do a monthly meeting and some that do. They don't do monthly meetings. What is the importance of doing a monthly or bi-weekly or whatever it is, team or, you know, staff meeting, whatever you want to call it, safety meeting? I mean, many practices do those. What do you? How do you? How important do you see those in the veterinary industry?

Speaker 1: 21:14

Yeah, I think they're crucial and some hospitals do daily rounds so that they know. You know more what's happening, and I think the more frequently that you have a meeting, the less monumental that meeting becomes, because otherwise you know, if you wait every month, you've got a lot of A lot to cover. Stuff to cover. Yeah, so I think the more frequently you can have a communication to get everybody on the same page, the more valuable it is.

Speaker 3: 21:50

Yeah, so our meeting is 15 minutes a day because we meet every day. If we were meeting weekly, we'd have to. You know we cover cancellations, premium increases, claims, and so if we waited a week for all the claims, depending on the time of year, we might have 50 claims in one week and we have to go through 50 claims. If you spend a minute on every claim, that's almost an hour just to talk about claims. And so you know, I think, having a very dedicated time of what you're doing and how you're doing you know this is just my industry, but it actually shortens up how you have to do things and then you can address issues and then, whether it's the entire team or just one individual after the meeting, whatever it might be, you don't let stuff simmer and you're able to address things on a much, much faster timeline. So, big picture and you talked about kind of the you know the making decision and strategies, but you know how important. You know we talked about meetings now having some of that vision, value statement and how important do you see that as having that as part of your practice?

Speaker 3: 22:58

I know some insurance agencies that I work with have a mission statement, a value statement Ours at Butler Vet Insurance is reducing the stress of insurance. So that's our number one goal as an insurance agency. Focusing on veterans is reducing the stress of insurance and it's kind of our North Star. How many practices do you know have kind of that North Star? Are they just operating as yep, we care for animals.

Speaker 1: 23:19

Nearly every hospital has a mission or a mission, vision and value statement. It might be 20 years old.

Speaker 3: 23:27

Sure.

Speaker 1: 23:28

And I do think that that's really important to make sure that the whole hospital knows what the vision of the hospital is. Rarely, everybody goes oh, I have one, that's it. What is it? Can you share that?

Speaker 2: 23:44

Do you know it?

Speaker 1: 23:46

Because having one is not the same thing as being able to make sure that everybody believes in the same culture, that they believe in the same mission, and so forth.

Speaker 1: 23:58

So I think it's really important to do that and you know, I had a fun session that I facilitated for a hospital a year or so ago and it was a SWOT analysis. So your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats and I think you know, like again taking time to sharpen your saw, taking that time to look at what are our strengths, because sometimes you know, when you're immersed right in the practice, it's too close, you don't recognize what some of those incredible strengths are. You know opportunities we, as an industry, we've been inundated since the pandemic and rarely come up even to breathe. I think we're seeing that that's changing a little bit, where we're getting a little bit more time, where you know we need to again reassess where we are in the storm. What do we need to look at? What are our opportunities? And the industries change dramatically, whether we're looking at private practice ownership and corporate practice ownership. We're looking at online pharmacies versus in-house.

Speaker 3: 25:21

I mean, even from when I started in this back in 2017, you're seeing a lot more private practice ownership trying to replicate or replicating the corporate practice and saying, okay, well, instead of just me owning the one practice, I want to own five or six. And they're saying, okay, we're going to own five or six locations and have their own small group, but it's not corporate owned, it's private owned and forming a group of owners. I think you know I wasn't seeing that when I first started in 2017, correct me if I'm wrong but now that's happening a lot more, because I think veterinarians are seeing the opportunity of some of the scale versus just saying you know, I'm operating my one three doctor practice here in Forest Lake or Lakeville, minnesota, or Apple Valley. Now I'm going to have five locations across a metro area or multi-state.

Speaker 1: 26:08

Yeah, and you know, really looking at and that kind of brings in threats like what are the threats? And maybe it's just Dr Google. How many pet owners are using Dr Google to answer things? Or Amazon is now offering telemedicine, or Chewie's offering telemedicine, amazon, walmart, like how they're entering.

Speaker 3: 26:35

Some of those well visit kind of things where they're starting the small practice.

Speaker 3: 26:40

Well, visit vaccination is that going to cut into your bottom line because it's easier to do? Number one rule in sales is make it easy for people to give you their money, and that's the rule of sales about the Butler Vet Insurance, because if you make it hard, people won't want to do it. So you know, that's one of the threats where I think in my industry we've commoditized the product A lot of times. People just look at insurance and they pay the premium and buy the insurance and with the you know Dr Google and the access to products and information, I think it's easy for a business to get commoditized, whether it's veterinary or insurance or a different one, and having that relationship piece.

Speaker 3: 27:23

So the SWOT analysis we try and do one every year and it's interesting what the owners SWOT analysis is versus what you know when you explain it to your team, what they see, the threats, and sometimes your team sees things that you have no ideas even there. So that's the importance of doing it, not just you doing it and telling the team, but you doing it and also having every team member say All right, what do we do well, what don't we do well and what are the opportunities you see that we have as a practice to grow and be better, and what are the things they could put us out of business?

Speaker 1: 27:56

And, bill, I think you know that was one of the most shocking things when I facilitated this was, you know, the threats that the staff were looking at might have been internal culture and or looking at corporate hospital or something, whereas the practice owner saw a threat. One lawsuit could you know? Put them out of business, put them out, yeah.

Speaker 1: 28:20

The staff didn't see that at all, and so I do think, like coming together as a whole hospital, you get a whole different perspective on what everybody's optics are, what, what do they see as a concern or an opportunity? So, and and I think you know, when we talk about that mission statement, it's only as current as you allow it to be, and a lot of buy-in doesn't happen if the staff doesn't know what it is. What is our vision statement? What is our vision, and refresh that from time to time.

Speaker 3: 29:06

I know at R&D Sui Try and we have more than just the daily meeting. But when we have an off-site meeting or kind of a staff meeting we run through all of our items on our mission statement or our value statement and a team member reads every single. So we go around the room like we're in seventh grade and everyone reads one paragraph or one statement. But it helps get buy-in from the team that everyone's rolling in the same direction and everyone's pulling the same direction. And then so for veterinary practice, when's a good time to revisit that? How often it's not an annual thing. Maybe it's that you don't wanna be changing that every month because then you don't have a common vision or direction that you're going. But you know, when do you see a good time for a practice to revisit that?

Speaker 1: 29:52

Well, I don't think that there's a magical time on the clock although if we don't put it on the calendar it often turns into 20 years but maybe it's on a special anniversary, or maybe it's at the advent of adding one more doctor, or maybe there's an ownership change or someone joins the leadership team.

Speaker 3: 30:18

Bringing on a partner.

Speaker 1: 30:19

yeah, yeah, that's a great time to revisit because if we don't, there's no expiration date on it, so we sometimes forget about you know, checking back in and it's pretty important to recalibrate. Do you know where your true North lies?

Speaker 3: 31:38

Well, especially now, as you've said that you know, with the pandemic and everyone being in max capacity, I think would probably be a good way to describe the veterinary industry, and now there are some pauses and breaks that are happening for different practices. It might be a good time to revisit that, of saying, okay, where do we wanna go and what do we wanna do. Now that it's we're feeling a change and it's time to recalibrate, to figure out where our passions lie.

Speaker 1: 32:06

Yeah, and then do we have the right people on the bus In the right seats?

Speaker 3: 32:12

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3: 32:12

We might have the right people they just might be in the wrong seats. So do we need to shuffle the deck a little bit? Well, I wanna wrap up with talking about one of your passions, which is the Minnesota Veterinary Medical Foundation. It brings a smile to your face every time we say those words. I know it does, and so I wound up as the porta potty sponsor for one of the MVMF events here in Minnesota, for the Sporting Clays shoot for the Future event, which is a fundraiser. Why don't you just describe? I think this is, I don't know how unique it is. It feels like it's unique to me. How unique is it? You've worked across in your different roles. You've worked with some very large organizations. How unique is this Number one? What is it, and how unique do you think it is in the industry?

Speaker 1: 33:00

Well, first off, I have to just give huge kudos. Our Minnesota Veterinary Medical Foundation is much more evolved than most of our neighboring states or most of the states in the country, and it's pretty profound to see how much it has grown. And every time that I spent five years as the president of the foundation, and every time that we would fill out our grants or our scholarships, I would write on the mirror in my office don't forget to give out $52,000 with the scholarships today. And I never really forgot. But it was just such an amazing feeling that, hey, today is grant day and I'd feel so proud and I kinda wanna do a pet in the back of my head and go back and then I'd go.

Speaker 1: 33:56

But look at how much more need there is, look at how crazy the mounting debt load is, look at all of the other avenues. The foundation also does grants for anything in animal education. So the miracle of birth, dog bite prevention, the student initiative for reservation, veterinary services with BART, basic animal rescue training, a whole host of things. And so I think that's really important and I again, I've been very blessed to be in this role and to have as many friends colleagues who I call friends in this industry, but I think that the need is huge. I think that some of our events that we do like you and I will work on the shoot for the future and we have about 140 participants and then we have dozens of volunteers that come out.

Speaker 3: 35:01

Volunteers and sponsors yep that come out and participate.

Speaker 1: 35:04

And the crazy thing about sponsors is when you go to another state, people will grow well and that's what their vet insurance is sponsoring this. My vet insurance company is not going to sponsor it because he's already there. This is a really different community that competitors will come out and sponsor one big event for the good of the whole community. I think that's where I think there's something really intriguing and fun and important. But everything we do too is we call it fun-drazing because it is the most fun way to give your money.

Speaker 3: 35:53

We just had our event shoot for the future a couple weeks ago. Just for those out there, we'll have links in the show notes. But the MVMF in Minnesota I think are probably our two or three biggest initiatives are student scholarships and grants for veterinary students. We have some very generous doctors who have put some endowments in there for veterinary dentistry and internships and externships and grants and scholarships In a whole host of areas. We have a lot of supporting members within the industry who've put grants and scholarships in place for various emergency medicine or large animal In Minnesota. Here we have a shortage of out-state veterinarians. I think there's some initiatives there as well. Then also just a plug for the Minnesota State Fair. We have the second largest state fair in the country. The Minnesota Veterinary Medical Foundation sponsors the Miracle of Birth. We have this huge but I don't know how many visitors we have at that event every year.

Speaker 1: 36:55

Over a million people come through the doors to see baby animals born.

Speaker 3: 37:01

You can see a cow get born. I stood there for two hours. My wife last year was so upset I was like this cow is going to give birth while I'm standing here. Nope, didn't. But you can see cows, chickens, goats, pigs all giving birth. There's baby chicks. It's a really cool thing. It's very popular. I mean, it's packed every time you go in there. Then, as Nona mentioned, a whole host of other things. But your passion for that, really it's infectious. It makes other people want to get involved. So that's very good and we'll have some info on the show notes again on the MVMF, but we're going to do a very first. We're actually meeting in a couple of weeks, I think, aren't we? For our vet gala?

Speaker 1: 37:49

So this is pretty exciting because so many of our events have been internal getting veterinarians to come and so forth. This will be kind of our first really big event where we would love to have animal lovers from all walks of life, veterinary hospital clients, come. So you've heard of the Met Gala where the Met Palton Museum of Art raises funds and people show up dressed in crazy outputs and so forth. This is going to be the first vet gala where we're hoping people show up with a mask like a masquerade party.

Speaker 3: 38:34

I've already decided I'm going to be Batman.

Speaker 1: 38:36

You're.

Speaker 3: 38:37

Batman, you know, because of a bat. Well, I'm going to try and I'm a writer, okay, I'm a writer and my wife will be Catwoman. So there, we've got the bat and the cat all set up. But I just know that that's one of the things that really sets you apart in the Minnesota veterinary community. Nona is your passion for that organization and you've incorporated some people like myself into that on a couple boards and just excited to give back to the community. Well, if people wanted to connect with you online or out in the world, where can they find Nona Nesseth in the world of the internet and connect with you about and see where you are?

Speaker 1: 39:18

They can connect through email, through Facebook.

Speaker 3: 39:24

I know you're big on the LinkedIn as well, so we'll get some of that information. This show notes LinkedIn, and then we'll have some information on the MVMA MVMF as well. So well, thank you so much for the time today, nona. It has been very insightful, as always. Connecting with you and having you share some of your insights with our listeners today. And remember, if you're listening to this podcast, like click and share this podcast with your friends and veterinarians. It helps with the algorithms. You know the internet and looking forward to seeing some of you soon at the vet gallon next spring. Thanks so much and thanks for joining us, nona.

Speaker 1: 40:07

Hey, thanks, bill, make it a powerful day.

Speaker 3: 40:12

Thanks for tuning in to Veterinary Blueprints. If you have any thoughts, questions or suggestions for an episode, I would love to hear from you. Email me at bill at butlervetinsurancecom. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode, and if you could do me a huge favor you know it helps with the algorithm. If you can like, share or comment on the post, leave a review, I would love it. Thanks for tuning in and until next time.