The future of dairy is about more than production capacity alone; it’s a question of succession, sustainability, and whether farming remains a viable livelihood for the next generation. For Cody Williams, third-generation operator of Wil-Roc Farms and now Del’s Roadside, the conversation begins long before processing plants, supply chains, or retail velocity. It begins with a simple observation: farming is aging and margins are tightening.
“The industry as a whole is getting older,” Williams says. “70% of agricultural assets in the U.S. will change hands in the next 2 decades. Food is the bedrock of society, and we need to bring the value back to farming.”
According to Williams, dairy is capital-dense, regulated, and operationally relentless. Consolidation, he notes, is not a trend; it’s a structural reality of the modern dairy economy, where margins fluctuate, pricing is often set far from the farm gate, and efficiency is not a choice but a prerequisite for survival.
“Dairy is traded like a commodity,” he explains. “The price is influenced long before it reaches the farm, so the question becomes: how do you build resilience into a system that you don’t fully price?” For Williams, the answer is diversification without disconnection, building new revenue pathways that strengthen the farm rather than divert from it. This strategy led to the 2023 expansion of Del’s Farmhouse Creamery and the retail launch of Del’s Roadside, two community storefronts that return the Williams family to the consumer-facing relationship their predecessors once built through home milk delivery in the 1930s and ’40s.
“We started by delivering a milk route to the doorstep, then the industry changed and pushed farms into more centralized production,” he says. “Going direct to the consumer again closes a circle for us. It gives us a way to build value from the farm all the way to someone’s table.” The strategy is about economics and proximity: shortening the distance between producer and consumer in ways that restore agency, storytelling, and margin to the farm level.
“A lot of value gets created after milk leaves the farm,” he says. This ethos extends into sustainability, a pillar Williams sees less as a compliance category and more as a long-term cost and energy strategy. Wil-Roc Farms is currently advancing a methane-to-energy system designed to convert manure emissions into electricity for on-farm use and grid contribution.
“It lets us capture methane, produce energy, lower the carbon factor of what we make, and return power back into the system,” he says. “When sustainability projects also strengthen the farm’s operating model, that’s when they become transformative instead of symbolic.” Yet beyond innovation in energy or retail, Williams believes the most urgent work is cultural: the reframing of farming as a viable, respected, and aspirational career path.
“There are not a lot of young people coming into this industry,” he says. “We want to be part of changing that. If we want passionate, smart, capable people to choose agriculture, we have to show that it can provide stability, impact, and a meaningful career,” he says. “Consumers want real, traceable, honest products from people they can trust. If we can build systems that return the value of that trust to the farm, we create better outcomes on both sides, farms win, communities win, and the next generation sees a future worth stepping into.”
He also believes public perception of dairy is shifting toward what he describes as a “back-to-real” product mindset, less about marketing labels, more about authenticity, nutrition, and origin. “People don’t want 12 competing signals on a carton anymore,” he says. “They want to know who made it, how they cared for the land, and if they can believe in the product. Trust is the currency now.”
That emphasis on transparency, lineage, and stewardship is what Williams hopes will shape the next generation of dairy leadership across farming communities navigating the same transition points.
“We are farmers first,” he says. “If we can rebuild systems that reward that work, improve quality of life for those doing it, and invite younger people into the future of food, then we are doing both, producing dairy and restoring something bigger. That’s the real legacy.”
