When you talk with Peter Fahrngruber, you understand almost immediately that his work has never simply been about ventilation, engineering or product lines. It’s about cows. It’s about people. And it’s about carrying a vision forward that started long before dairy ventilation was even considered an important part of the industry.

Peter grew up on a dairy farm, and while he didn’t immediately pursue agriculture after school, those early years shaped and guided everything he has built today.

His connection to ventilation began with an unexpected nudge from his wife, Deborah, who found a job posting for a Canadian ventilation company and encouraged him to apply.

Application submitted. Life changed.

What started as a role in agricultural ventilation grew into decades of experience across North America, working on everything from dairy facilities to global poultry systems before eventually helping shape something brand new.

By 2008, Peter and longtime colleague John McBride saw a gap in the dairy industry that they couldn’t ignore. Barns relied almost entirely on natural airflow: curtains rolled up in summer, cold breezes in winter, and animals left to absorb whatever Mother Nature delivered. It wasn’t enough.

“Back then, ventilation really wasn’t part of the dairy industry. Natural-vent barns were uncomfortable, inconsistent, and risky. If it rained, some rain made it in the building. If it snowed, the building would freeze up. If it was really hot, the wind generally stopped blowing and cows went into heat stress. They got sick. Their production dropped. And sometimes it took months to recover,” he explains of the “why” behind VES.

Peter and John knew it could be different, and that’s how VES was born.

“Someone needed to build a company that existed to solve real animal problems, not just products,” Peter shares. “We thought, why shouldn’t it be us?”

That belief became VES.

Building Something Different From Day One

From the beginning, VES was founded on a simple but powerful philosophy: understand the problem fully, use technology to fix it, and never stop learning from the cows themselves.

For Peter, the difference between working for someone else and building VES was night and day.

“What excited me was everything that we couldn’t do when you work for somebody,” he says. “Farmers needed solutions that adapted to real-world challenges, not products frozen in time simply because the tooling had already been paid for. We started developing a business around that whole model of how do we truly make a difference.”

That meant studying airflow, studying buildings, and studying cows to understand what they needed and when they needed it.

Peter quickly saw that the industry’s obsession with small, power-hungry fans wasn’t just inefficient, it was working against the animals. So, VES went the opposite direction. John, Peter and Chad Miles developed a 72-inch fan “that everyone thought was wild”.

“People thought we were crazy,” Peter laughs, but shares that he knew the science was sound. “Combined with a VFD, those large fans could maintain consistent airflow with far less energy and far more impact.”

Just as important, VES started designing barns differently. Instead of overpowering the building with fans and hoping the airflow landed somewhere near the cows, the VES approach focused on how many cows were in the barn, how big the space was, where the air needed to go, and how to ensure the animals, not the rafters, benefitted.

“The cows live low,” he explains. “Our fans would be redirecting the air and helping ensure that the proper amount of fresh air is delivered to where the cows live. They made a difference.”

This was more than ventilation. It was the beginning of the company’s cow comfort mission.

A Voice for the Cow

Peter says that one of the most meaningful decisions he has made in his career came early in the company’s history: hiring veterinarian Dr. Michael Wolf, who became a cornerstone of the VES philosophy.

“We talked to him. We asked if we could hire him as a consultant?” Peter recalls. Dr. Wolf wanted tools to measure cow health, and Peter wanted someone who would make sure the company never drifted from its mission.

“He said, I always want to be the voice of the cow so that you guys don’t get to thinking about money only.”

The promise stuck.

Today, Dr. Wolf’s name is still on the VES building to serve as a physical reminder of what the company stands for. Together, they researched, refined, tested, and proved every concept, visiting farms across the country and grounding every design decision in real animal outcomes.

The result wasn’t just better barns. It was healthier cows, stronger herds, and dairies able to weather challenges because the environment inside the barn stayed safe, consistent, and predictable.

A Team Built With Purpose

“We have a group of employees that really, truly want to make a difference,” he says.

And that mindset runs through every department.

His sales team, he notes, doesn’t approach dairies with a product pitch. They show up ready to understand, diagnose, and solve, “They want to basically provide a solution to help that dairy understand what their issues could be.”

Before they ever recommend equipment, they study the dairy’s site, buildings, wind exposure, climate, and even the number of hours the cows are likely under stress. Then they bring in expertise from across the company — analytics, service, engineering — to craft the right plan.

And once a system is built?

VES is still there.

“We visit after the sale to make sure it’s still working properly… making sure it’s fine-tuned for summertime ventilation, fine-tuned for the worst days in the winter,” he says. “Dairy families are planning for generations, and VES does the same. Our future is our customer’s future.”

Where We’ve Been; Where We’re Going

Looking back, Peter is most proud of the mindset shift VES helped create in the dairy world. When he started, ventilation wasn’t a priority. Today, dairies across North America understand the impact of controlled environments, technology integration, and animal-first design.

And VES hasn’t stopped evolving.

The goal remains the same: How do we continue to use technology to improve cow – animal – comfort?

The future is bright — and still full of opportunity. Technology continues to advance, dairies continue to grow and adapt, and VES continues to build systems that prepare farms not just for today, but for the next generation.

It’s fitting, then, that the phrase he and John began with nearly two decades ago is still the heart of the work Peter and the VES-Artex team does: “We’re a voice for the cow,” he’ll tell you.