Right People.
Our team
CEO
David Briggs
David Briggs was raised on a diversified farm in Goshen County, Wyo., and obtained a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Midland Lutheran College in Fremont, Neb. He has served as CEO of WESTCO, a large cooperative headquartered in Alliance, Neb., for the last 25 years. He is one of the founders of Sustainable Beef LLC and currently serves as Chairman of the Board and CEO. He also serves on United Benefits Group Board in Kansas City, providing pension benefits to most cooperatives in the Midwest. Some of his past Board service includes Box Butte General Hospital in Alliance, Cofina Financial in Minneapolis and Nebraska Cooperative Council in Lincoln.
GENERAL MANAGER
Ryan Wagnon
Ryan was raised on a commercial cow calf operation in Northwest, Okla., that still operates today. He graduated from Oklahoma Panhandle State College in 2002 with degree in Ag Business. Ryan began his career at Conagra Foods in Cactus, Texas, as part of the company’s Manager in Training program. He spent the next 22 years in Texas, working his way through all levels of management at large beef processing facilities, most recently with JBS USA.
HR & SAFETY MANAGER
Ashley Henning
Ashley comes to Sustainable Beef with 17 years of meat industry experience. Born and raised on the family farm in southwest Minnesota, Ashley graduated in 2007 from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities with a major in Management, Psychology, and Communication and a minor in Spanish. Upon graduation, she went directly into the beef industry as an Assistant Industrial Engineer with JBS USA. After six months, she was promoted to Industrial Engineer and moved to Texas. In 2012, she moved into Safety Manager roles, which she has held ever since. In May 2022, Ashley graduated from Colorado State University with a Master’s Degree in Business.
CONTROLLER
Daniel Myers
Daniel was born in Colorado, raised in Illinois and returned to Colorado after high school. Upon his return, he worked on ranches and feedlots while attending Colorado State University, graduating with a B.S. degree in Animal Science. For the next 20 years, Daniel remained in the cattle industry, working on ranches in Colorado, Idaho, Montana and California. He later earned an MBA in Finance and Accounting while working as a Beef Operations Manager for the University of California-Davis. To gain experience in accounting and finance, I left the cattle industry and worked as an Accounting Manager and Controller for 10 year, the first five of which were spent as the Accounting Manager/Controller for the largest farm-raised caviar company in the U.S. He spent the last five years as the Accounting Manager/Controller for a rice company with just under $200 million in annual revenue.
IT MANAGER
Kris Smith
Kris grew up on a cattle feedlot and corn farm operation in Hershey, Nebr. He graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with a degree in Business-Finance. After college, he built his career in Denver, Colo., where he worked for large banks. Ultimately, he cofounded and built a technology company in the legal/financial space.
MAINTENANCE MANAGER
Paul Huggenberger
Paul was born and raised on a farm in Emerson, Neb. He graduated from Emerson-Hubbard High School and began his career from an early age, spending nine years at a grain elevator company, and later, several years as a loop electronic coordinator for US West/Quest Phone company in Denver, Colo. After moving to Dumas, Texas, he began his career in the beef packing industry with JBS USA in Cactus, working as a slaughter floor mechanic before being promoted to maintenance supervisor. He spent six years in leadership on the front lines, gaining expertise in the machinery and operations of a beef packing plant. In 2012, Paul was promoted to project manager for the Cactus facility. In that role, he was responsible for managing capital improvements for the entire facility. During this time, he also helped manage all maintenance departments, including fabrication and slaughter floors, refrigeration and ammonia, electrical, boiler operations and distribution center operations. In 2024, Paul returned to Nebraska to serve as maintenance manager for Sustainable Beef.