
David (Dave) Anderson is a 1984 Graduate of Emporia State University (Kansas) with a Bachelors degree in Business. Having worked at grocery retail thru school, he started his career path with Nestle/Carnation company, working in sales/trade marketing in Midwest, Texas, Northeast market areas. Before arriving at Bard Valley Date Growers in 2008, Dave also included stints in retailer foodservice merchandising & perishable / specialty food broker sales & marketing. He is presently the Vice President of Sales & Marketing for BVDG, and manages a sales team of seven, and a marketing team of three, with both top and bottom line accountability with CEO and growers. His category experience in the Produce Business is extensive and includes deep knowledge in dried fruit, avocados, pears, cherries and soft fruit (peaches, plums, nectarines).
Michael (Mike) Boland is the Koller Professor at the University of Minnesota where he has teaching, research, and outreach responsibilities in agribusiness management and in particular, agricultural cooperatives. In addition, he is Director of the University of Minnesota Food Industry Center and was elected to the board of directors for the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association. He also sits on the board of the Council on Food, Agriculture, and Resource Economics (C-FARE) in Washington DC. He is a member of Harvard’s Private and Public, Scientific, Academic, and Consumer Food Policy Group.
Dave Mansheim a Business Unit Manager for Gowan Company currently manages Bard Date Company and Global Agricultural Products as well as oversight of packing and growing operations in Mexico of Medjool Dates. Dave joined Gowan Co. in 1995 as Manager of Desert Depot, a third party logistic/warehousing company. Under his management, they established the first Foreign Trade “Sub Zone” with private privileges in the nation. In 2005 Dave was tasked as International Business Manager where he worked directly with Global Executives in the transition phase to establish operational procedures within their organizations.
Originally from rural Iowa Dave managed a full service Grain Elevator in Salem, Iowa before joining the US Marine Corps in 1983. He served 4 years as a Marine Air Traffic Controller achieving an FAA, Radar Facility Rating. After leaving the Marine Corps in 1987 he worked in the aviation industry where he progressed in positions from Line Pilot, Chief Pilot, FAA Check Airman to Director of Operations for an Advance Life Support Air Ambulance. In addition Dave spent 3 seasons doing aerial application in South East Iowa. Dave holds ATP, CFII, MEI and RATCF FAA ratings. He is a graduate of Southern Illinois University and is past President of the Bard Valley Medjool Date Growers Association
Gregory Mckee is Professor of Agricultural Economics at University of Nebraska. His teaching and research interests include financial performance of cooperative businesses; management of cooperative businesses; marketing activities of cooperative businesses; and contracting and vertical integration in agriculture and agribusiness. Dr. McKee is also interested in the economics of invasive species management, which includes the cost and benefit of policies designed to manage invasive species and the information requirements to develop such policies. He teaches courses in cooperative business management and in agribusiness industrial strategy. Dr. McKee received his M.S. and PhD in Agricultural Resource Economics from University of California, Davis.
Tim Rooney, CEO of Bard Valley Date Growers Association and Datepac LLC has been a C-level executive for the last 12 years in Food Processing / Consumer Packaged Goods. Prior to working in Consumer-Packaged Goods, he was a Management Consultant providing guidance to improve the performance of organizations for a variety of industries domestically and internationally, including U.S. Navy, Pharmaceutical, Food Processing, Mining, Silicon Chips, Finance, Banking and Insurance, Plastics, and Chemicals
Paul Snyder is Executive Vice President at the Tillamook County Creamery Corporation. A member of the Executive Team and reporting to the CEO, he leads several functions including corporate responsibility, sustainability, community engagement, corporate communications, government affairs, farm services, and co-op member relations. He joined Tillamook in June of 2019
Previously, Paul was Global Vice President – Corporate Responsibility at InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG). In that role, Paul co-led IHG’s global Corporate Responsibility function and directly oversaw sustainability strategy and execution for the company’s nearly 5,200 hotels worldwide.
Paul earned a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature at Lawrence University and an MBA at Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management.