Karen Penfold is a Queensland grazier and business owner within a multi-property beef enterprise supplying directly into a major supermarket supply chain.

Together with her husband and four daughters, they have built a vertically integrated cattle business turning over 13,000 head annually — and growing. The business spans breeding, backgrounding and feedlot operations across multiple properties in Queensland.

Karen will share the Four Daughters export journey — the ambition, the opportunities and the hard lessons that come with building market pathways beyond the farm gate. She speaks openly about the commercial realities, processing constraints and the resilience required when plans change.

She will then take the audience behind the scenes, sharing how her family is intentionally aligning across generations to support long-term growth. Having experienced the cost of unclear succession earlier in life, Karen now leads with clarity, structure and strong communication — bringing daughters and sons-in-law into defined roles and shared direction.

Karen combines lived on-farm experience, and with a background in education and leadership, she offers practical, grounded insights for grazing families navigating both growth and transition.

Her message is simple: if you want the business to grow, the family has to grow with it.