13/05/2026
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WHERE DOES THE RETURN ON INVESTMENT COME FROM? 🤷🏼
Where can you expect robots to deliver savings and improvements that will actually make a difference to your bottom line? Let’s dive into the top five, according to Lely Gippsland clients:
📈 INCREASED MILK VOLUMES
Largely come from cows being milked more than twice per day (between 2.2-2.4 times on average in Gippsland Lely systems). Early-lactation and high-producing cows will often visit the robots 3+ times per day, while cows winding down their production start visiting less than twice per day, leaving more robot time for the fuller girls. Not having to hold that milk allows cows to produce more overall.
Milk production is also aided by individual feeding of cows according to their needs, individual milking of each quarter, and improvements in cow health and temperament that are seen in voluntary systems. Our Gippsland customers commonly see production increases of 10-15% moving from a conventional dairy to a Lely AMS.
📉 REDUCED LABOUR COSTS
Latest Dairy Monitor figures show average Gippsland farms milk 110 cows per FTE (full time equivalent), while some of our Lely AMS farms in Gippsland milk over 200 cows per FTE. This allows many farms to keep labour within the family and do away with often hard-to-find, unreliable and expensive outside labour. Some use the time saved to focus on new areas like pasture management and breeding, which creates further savings or income streams.
📉 REDUCED HEALTHCARE COSTS
Our customers report:
- Less lameness, as cows walk to robots at their own pace versus being herded in large groups, which can cause muddy tracks and lots of standing.
- Less mastitis and better udder health, as advanced teat sensors and pulsators treat each teat individually, while studies have shown that the Astronaut’s unique counter-rotating brush system is 40% more effective at cleaning and stimulating than traditional methods.
- Savings in drugs used and time treating health issues, resulting in a lower herd replacement rate. Advanced health reports make it easier to see early warning signs of abnormalities and allow preventative treatment before illnesses become clinical.
📈 IMPROVED CONCEPTION RATE
With highly accurate automatic heat detection and drafting, you can inseminate cows at the right moment for improved conception rates. Less hours spent inspecting the herd and less milk 'left on the table' from missed opportunities.
📉 REDUCED GRAIN COSTS
Thanks to feeding to production. Feed is one of the highest costs on a dairy farm, so efficiency adds up. Lely robots calculate optimum feed rations at every milking based on individual cow data, including production data and stage of lactation. So your top milkers are fueled for high volumes, without wasting additional feed on lower producers that don't require it.
Lely Astronaut A5 Next robots are also incredibly energy and water efficient, and are built to last with long wearing parts and easy access for maintenance.
Rowan Stokes from Wild Dog Dairy shared how the numbers add up for him: "The calculations on paying the robots off over a few years doesn’t come out too different to paying staff. And we can depreciate the robots, they're an asset we own at the end of it."
A former Warragul boy now running a farm in Tasmania, Rowan installed eight Lely Astronaut A3 robots to milk 300 of his 750 cows, which he says he’s paying off "fairly rapidly" as a share farmer. To see Rowan's full interview, click here: youtube.com/watch?v=aBMvnFtrnwc
