tractors do you do?

I came attracted to them, I suppose, they were just a rare tractor.

Martin

Well, we wouldn't go as far as

Martin, we don't follow Martin around the place, but...

No, I remember seeing my uncle had them for years at Silage, and I suppose my father would have drove them, and I'm only young for that, but I bought my one to go on the Munster Run, It was just something that I thought I'd like to do.

We found the tractor I bought, which is rare.

It's a four-wheel drive model.

Mm-hmm

... where some of our scientists were, were serving.

Uh, but it's, it's been a, a, a fairly consecutive, uh, event.

Um, we- it's held at our Lockwood Farm, which is in Hamden, Connecticut, um, right off of Route 10.

Uh, and, um, the event is, it's really designed as, as our one, you know, our largest public outreach event that we have.

Um, we typically get between 900 and 1,100 attendees who come.

Um, there's a, a formal program that starts at 10:00 AM.

Uh, can you give us a, a, a quick, uh, kind of orientation as to how you are looking at this, uh, issue?

Can you give us a quick kind of orientation as to how you are looking at this issue?

Yeah, sure.

So food safety in general is one of our largest and oldest programs.

It actually dates to the late 1800s when we started testing food for chemical contaminants.

The state of Connecticut actually has a very good division of labor, where we at the Ag Experiment Station, we handle chemical concerns related to food.

So pesticides, toxic metals, arsenic.

We have new programs on PFAS and micro and nanoplastics.

We'll start with mosquitoes because I believe we identified the first affected mosquito with which condition was it? Yes.

Mm-hmm.

So I think you have all of that going on, but then at the same time, what we work on together a lot is if all of that's happening for the consumer, there's also really a need for trust, right? And as you think about all that automation, all the things that you're kind of counting on and relying on, there's a need for trust.

And I think what Lilly does incredibly well is when it comes to communication and when it comes to interacting with the consumer, it's all about authenticity, and it's about really connecting on a very human way.

So while AI feels so much of what this industry does, I think from a communication standpoint, we actually not push against it, but we lean into authenticity and humanity.

Yeah.

You know? You care about health above all.

And when you start to put that lens on everything you do, and you start to think patient first, and that that is a human being, that is a person, all of a sudden what I think you historically have known to see ... what you're used to seeing from a master brand completely changes.

Now, we can establish that trust, but then we can talk to you about things like Alzheimer's, and we can talk to you about things like making sure you're checking yourself for breast cancer because we've started to establish who we are as a brand-

Uh, are either of you, d- maybe you said it, or, are veterans or you just decided to ha- you had friends that, or, or people you knew that committed suicide and you wanted to get involved?

I'm, myself, I'm a six-year Army veteran.

Um, and have 100% rating for PTSD and TBI.

Um, so I'm well aware of the mental struggles that, uh, veterans go through.

I mean, w- you're talking about the Javon there that you hang with, and Leos are a lot like military.

Their, their perception and their closeness to giving up everything far beyond the regular person's grasp and concept.

And, uh, I have my wife, I have my granddaughter, I have my daughter as a support system, and I'm telling you, anybody in any of those situations, Leo or military, that doesn't have a good support system i- is in a situation destined to fail.

And if you don't see it in our store, hit us up on our contact form because we'd love to get it headed your way.

Do you provide advice to them like, hey, this is a little bit, this feels high for us in order to win this bid? Or do you feel like, is it a race to the bottom in order to win these bids? Or maybe my question is how much competition is there? Like, how likely are you to win these bids?

That's what I'm saying.

You always have to make this.

So when me and my team are submitting proposals, we always have to assume we're in a bidding war.

Just put it in your head.

I'm not the only person going for this particular solicitation.

I'm not the only person.

How does the government, do they go online and check your website? Do they directly call the owner of the business multiple times? Is this like an interview process? What does that look like?