The International Year of the Woman Farmer is Celebrating Wisconsin Women in Agriculture

In partnership with: Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection.

The United Nations General Assembly has declared 2026 as the International Year of the Woman Farmer with plans to highlight the role that women play globally in agriculture. Wisconsin is home to more than 37,600 female farmers, as of 2022, making Wisconsin women in agriculture 35% of the total producers.

These farmers, farm wives, moms and daughters are the backbone of the industry, working tirelessly day in and day out. These women deserve even more than just one year of celebration. Read on to meet three operations led by some of these hard-working women.

A Leap to Lavender – Sisters Mindy and Kristy Kearney

In Lomira, Mindy Kearney and her sister, Kristy, founded Purple Thumb Lavender to preserve their family farm after their father’s sudden death in 1986. After dreaming of solutions to make the farm productive again, they landed on the niche lavender market. The pair now has 500 plants in the ground and a wide selection of lavender products available for sale, including a bath and body line, home goods, gourmet food items and a new apothecary line.

See more: Wisconsin Lavender Farms Offer a New Type of Agritourism Experience

The tricky part for the duo is learning the tools of the trade without having been raised on a production farm.

“We are learning everything as we go,” Mindy Kearney says. “We are also balancing a lot of different things in life as we raise our own kids, run our households and work other jobs. It is challenging sometimes to feel like you are doing it all well.”

For Kearney, it’s worth the challenge.

“For me, being a woman in agriculture means doing work that feels nurturing, creative and rooted in community – qualities I think women bring to the table so naturally,” Kearney says.

Lisa Schlimgen, Dreamy 280 Farm Fresh Meats LLC

Lisa Schlimgen runs Dreamy 280 Farm Fresh Meats LLC on 280 acres in the Driftless region of Southern Wisconsin alongside her husband and grown children.

For many years, the farm sold a few beef quarters and halves to friends and family. However, while doing the books one evening, Schlimgen says she had a “light bulb moment” when she reviewed their meat sales.

“I thought, ‘I know I can sell more meat,’” she says. “I put a sign out on the highway and people started calling and stopping in to buy meat.”

Business was booming, so they built a store and added farmers markets to their busy schedule.

See more: Wisconsin Bison Farm Produces Tasty, Healthy Bison Meat

Schlimgen had another novel idea for a 24-hour meat vending machine, where they sell everything from beef jerky to tenderloin.

“People use it all hours of the day and night,” she says.

As a woman in agriculture, Schlimgen certainly feels the pressure. “I’m doing chores, calving, farm books, store books, advertising and more,” she says. “One of my biggest challenges is just doing it all, doing it well and keeping my head above water while doing it.”

But she’s not backing down.

“Women are saying we’re here too and we have a place in the farm space,” Schlimgen says.

Shelly Mayer is Beefing Up Sales

Just north of metro Milwaukee, Shelly Mayer and her husband, Dwight, are working hard to keep their eighth-generation farmland productive and profitable. The couple bought the Mayer farm from Dwight’s parents in 1997, where they continued to milk three times a day in their 63-stall barn for 25 years.

“I did all the milking along with him,” Mayer says. “There were about 13 years where I milked the night shift with him in addition to working off the farm.”

With urban sprawl closing in, Mayer was even more determined to remain a working farm, which fueled creativity and reassessing their business model.

See more: Wisconsin Women in Agriculture Compete to Serve as Ambassador

“We live on a busy road where there’s a lot of people driving by,” Mayer says. They leveraged their location to offer high-quality local meat directly to consumers.

Mayer Farms Beef was licensed by the state of Wisconsin in 2018 to sell beef directly from the farm and now harvests 50 to 55 steers annually to be sold by the pound.

“Being women business leaders, sometimes we try to do it all and feel inadequate because we want to excel in everything.”

But her goal has never been to be treated equally on the farm.

“Why would I want to be treated equally? I’m unique,” she says. “Satin and denim are both strong, and we don’t always have to be covered in denim.”