Gary Cammack of Union Center, Ag Business Person of the Year
2009 Black Hills Stock Show Banquet and Ball
Cammack attended grade school at Stoneville, SD, and graduated from Sturgis Brown High School in 1971.
The lifelong South Dakota resident and his wife Amy started their ranch supply store in Stoneville in 1973 and moved the business to Union Center in 1979.
Cammack says they try to come up with secondary products from non-ag manufacturing that can be used for agricultural purposes. For example, the Cammacks buy recycled tires from large mining vehicles and re-sell them as livestock water tanks. The South Dakota couple also buys 4- by 48-foot wood panels manufactured elsewhere in the nation and sell them for use as corrals and windbreaks.
The Cammacks expanded the business to new facilities, including a strip mall, in 2000.
“One of the reasons we’ve been here as long as we have is we understand the customers because we live their problems,” said the South Dakota rural business innovator.
The Cammacks, who also have their own cow-calf operation on 7,000 acres, are fourth-generation West River ranchers. Their four sons are also involved, in varying degrees, with the ranch.
Cammack Ranch Supply regularly draws customers from a five-state area. The South Dakota company, which employs about 20 people, also constructs large post-frame buildings.
Cammack has had a commercial exhibit at South Dakota’s premier livestock show since it moved to the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center in 1978. The Cammacks are also longtime supporters of the Western Junior Livestock Show.
Cammack Ranch Supply was named a friend of the South Dakota Farm Bureau.
Besides the business ventures, Cammack is involved in conservation. In 2000, the Cammacks received the Region 7 Environmental Stewardship Award from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association. They won the state award from the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association.
Cammack is a member of Community Baptist Church Board, Central Meade County Community Center Board, Greater Sturgis Life Care Foundation Board, South Dakota Ag and Rural Leadership Alumni, Future Sturgis Committee3, Meade County Republicans, South Dakota Game, Fish & Parks Advisory Panel, South Dakota Farm Bureau, South Dakota Farmers Union, South Dakota Cattlemen’s Association, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, South Dakota Stockgrowers Association and R-CALF USA.
For more information, contact Ron Jeffries, general manager of the Black Hills Stock Show at 605-355-3861.
