Our story is that of humble beginnings. Growing up on a dairy and hog farm in central Holland, Henk didn’t dream of starting his own company. He dreamt of working his way around the world, learning as much as he could about what he was passionate about, calves. And work he did. After attending agricultural college for animal nutrition as well as ag business, he took every calf care job he could find, learning new languages and the art of caring for calves along the way. That pursuit of knowledge brought him across Europe, and eventually to the US, where he completed his masters research in calf nutrition. From there he became a nutritionist for a large animal nutrition company in the US.
However, when they were sold to a new company and let all their employees go, he found himself with a brand-new baby to provide for, but no job to do the providing.
He realized that along his journey, he had acquired a unique set of skills, as well as the knowledge of how to make the most nutritionally sound milk replacer on the market. His goal was simple: raise healthier calves. He knew this goal would not only help the calves, but also his customers. Healthier baby animals have higher growth rates, less loss, lower vet bills and less one on one care is needed. From that idea, Esmilco was born.
Henk started small; he began by working out of a home office in his basement and selling custom manufactured milk replacers out of his trailer. He slowly and patiently grew the company from a basement office in Minnesota, to a larger office in Wisconsin. After working with a custom manufacturer for the first decade, he bought a production facility of his own, which allowed him to service any customer in the US while maintaining reasonable freight rates, and as always, a nutritionally sound product at a fair price.
The company may have grown in size, however, our goal remains the same. Raise healthy animals. We do this by working one on one with our customers to develop a milk replacer tailored to their herds specific needs. We ask questions because we know one formulation most certainly does not fit all. We tailor each formulation to match the feeding schedule, goals, weights, and ages of the calves we formulate for. Because we know healthy calves make for happy calf raisers.
As a family-owned company with Dutch Heritage and strong Midwestern values, we go the extra mile to ensure your calves are getting exactly what they need, and nothing they don’t.
