2011 Annual Conference
July 11-13, 2011
Sheridan, Wyoming

NAAMO Colleagues and Friends,

Welcome to Wyoming! We are delighted to serve as your host for the annual NAAMO Conference in beautiful Sheridan, Wyoming, July 10-13. Sheridan was recently honored as the top western town in America and in 2011 was honored as one of the top two destinations in America by the National Historic Trust. With its rich cultural heritage and abundance of activities, Sheridan and the nearby Bighorn Mountains will provide a wonderful backdrop for NAAMO. We promise to provide you with a great conference and lots of good, old-fashioned hospitality—the Cowboy Way!

Next week, we are sending you a full packet of information on the conference, including other tourist information. We encourage you to spend time in other parts of Wyoming during your stay. You can fly directly to Sheridan or Billings, Montana or you can also drive to Wyoming and enjoy other tourism attractions. (Mileage: Billings, MT—130; Rapid City, SD—250 mi; Denver, CO—430 mi.) Several times a month until the conference, I will be e-mailing you an update and highlighting one of the speakers or tours each time.

We have tried to keep conference prices down so you can afford to attend the conference and build in a family vacation at the same time. July 8 -10, we are truly excited to provide you with a pre-conference tour to Yellowstone National Park, America's first national park. We want you to bring your family to Wyoming with you, so the Wyoming Business Council is subsidizing the pre-trip and only charging you for your room. If you are not bringing your family and are willing to share a room with someone else in while in Yellowstone, please indicate so on the registration form.

During the conference, we will provide a program for adult guests, as well as youth activities. With such a rich historic area and the beautiful Big Horn Mountains, there is plenty to do. We have some ideas for the kids program, but are waiting to see the ages of the children before we get too carried away. Wednesday afternoon can be used as free time or you can participate in several optional activities. Additional activities Wednesday include: a tour of the Little Bighorn Battlefield, a golf outing on the Powderhorn (Sheridan is known as the golf capital of Wyoming), and an evening PRCA rodeo.

During the NAAMO conference, we hope to show you what marketing agriculture in a state with only 550,000 people and 97,000 square miles is like. Learning about each other's programs is a vital part of any conference, and we have allowed plenty of time for networking. Don't forget to bring a gift for the gift exchange. This is always a fun way to receive something from another state or province.

We look forward to seeing you in the Cowboy State!

Cindy Garretson-Weibel, Agribusiness Director
Wyoming Business Council