Rancher's Choice - The Right Choice

The roots of the Dillabaugh brothers go back to their family farm in Coleville, Saskatchewan which was started by their father in 1940. Though Bill & Don never lost interest in farming they did differ on the type of farm. "Don liked the grain side and I the livestock," says Bill. This belief system saw growth on both sides of the fence as they developed a commercial cattle operation, grain and raised some Appaloosa horses. Like most entrepreneurs maintaining the status quo was not enough, so the brothers eventually formed a partnership. They also started asking some veterinarians, "What were the best cattle?" The answer was Angus, if they were bigger, and so it began. Double AA Angus, in 1970 started down the road to produce better cattle, and built a herd of 212 registered Angus cattle. They began to concentrate on line breeding, emphasizing the excellent traits found in Annie K cows. In their building phase there was also the influx of new continental breeds gaining a foot hold in the industry. Bill & Don knew they had fine cattle, but developing a market was a difficult process. "We traveled around, talked to people and got people to try them", Bill recalls of the early years. Eventually they found a willing rancher and made a deal to have Double AA bulls breed the bottom end of his herd. As Bill relates the story, "I told him, if you have a loss on these calves, we'll write you a cheque. As it turned out, that rancher's bottom end calves out performed the rest of his herd. They never looked back."

By 1980, the brothers decided to host an annual bull sale at Double AA and quickly developed a reputation as a premier seed stock supplier to commercial cattlemen in Saskatchewan, Alberta and the Northern States. Eventually, this annual sale would become the foundation of the Rancher's Choice group.