[Cornucopia will update this page with additional findings as they occur.]
Aurora Organic Dairy is under increased scrutiny due to a history of non-compliances with the National Organic Program standards, practices Cornucopia believes constitute industrialization in violation of organic integrity, and a lack of transparency.
The company has been under long-term scrutiny from The Cornucopia Institute due to its highly questionable livestock management and organic practices.
As per Cornucopia’s Scorecard Adjustments Policy Aurora Organic Dairy’s score will be impacted until they participate in Cornucopia’s repair policy, which includes being transparent about their suppliers and production practices.
Cornucopia’s policy impacts the following Aurora Organic Dairy product lines:
High Meadow (Aurora Organic Dairy)
[NOTE: Aurora also sells milk for a non-organic “regenerative” A2 brand of milk (Grazeful Dairy), which Cornucopia does not score.]
Aurora Organic Dairy is one of the largest suppliers of organic milk to grocery chains such as Costco, Safeway, and Walmart. Aurora’s milk is sold to many of these groceries for re-packaging under store brand names, aka private labels. Aurora also markets their own product under the High Meadow brand.
In August 2007, Aurora was sanctioned by the USDA after the agency’s investigators found 14 “willful” violations of federal organic law. The USDA investigation was sparked by several legal complaints filed by Cornucopia, documenting numerous organic improprieties from our own on-site visits and investigation of Aurora’s practices.
After a probationary period, Aurora continued operations.
Early investigations by Cornucopia also included fly-over photography of Aurora’s operations in Texas (Aurora’s Coldwater facility and Dublin facility). Cornucopia submitted complaints to the National Organic Program concerning Aurora’s alleged violations of the organic standards (Cornucopia’s complaints and investigative work can be found here).
In 2017, an investigative report by The Washington Post found milk from Aurora Organic Dairy was nutritionally deficient compared to organic family-scale production.
Aurora also worked to industrialize the production of heifers (young cows that haven’t started producing milk yet).
In 2025, Aurora launched a non-organic “regenerative” line of milk. This quote from the CEO summarizes the product: “We have launched the new brand Grazeful Dairy™, a pasture-grazed, regenerative milk brand made exclusively from A2/A2 herds to provide consumers a new value-added alternative to commodity milk products.”
Aurora maintains a sustainability report. The 2025 version reports approximately 25,000 milking and dry cows (similar to previous reports), and approximately 18,000 calves and heifers.
In 2026, Aurora Dairy operations in Colorado were issued a temporary variance. Variances are essentially approved exemptions from the organic production and handling requirements requested by certified operations or their certifiers (regulations at § 205.290 Temporary variances). These exemptions are most often used when there are natural disasters declared by the Secretary of Agriculture, or damage caused by severe weather that could make it difficult or impossible to meet the minimum standards .
In this case, the state of Colorado and the certifier Where Food Comes From Organic applied for the variance, which applies only to Aurora Organic Farms (High Plains Dairy in Gill, CO and Platteville Dairy in Platteville, CO). Under this variance, Aurora’s cattle only need to be provided with 10% average dry matter intake (DMI) from pasture with a grazing season of no less than 75 days in 2026 (outside of variances, the minimum organic requirement is 30% DMI during the 120-day grazing season).
Cornucopia strongly disagrees with this use of variance in some cases, including the 2026 variances. Because Aurora Organic Dairy has received variances to avoid meeting the minimum organic grazing standards many times in both Colorado and Texas, that indicates something about the brand and their practices. Aurora has located these operations in regions where drought is now part of the norm, and they have done little to safeguard grazing land from the worst impacts of drought.
Organic farms are required to conserve and improve the natural resources of an operation. Research shows, when this is done properly, it insulates the land from the harsh effects of drought. In fact, Cornucopia is aware of dairies that have been under a variance for their area and did not need to use it. With exceptional care for fields, those operations were able to meet the minimum grazing standards even during times of drought. For an excellent write-up on this problem of variances, NODPA’s recent commentary is insightful and takes into the account the nuance in this issue.
More from Cornucopia on Aurora Organic Dairy
The following collection of topics and links provide an overview of the problems at Aurora and Cornucopia’s previous campaigns concerning this organic brand:
Aurora High Plains Factory Dairy
Additional Information:
In April 2026, Aurora, along with other major organic dairy brands who are members of the Coalition for Organic Dairy Exemption (CODE), challenged their required participation in the Federal Milk Marketing Order (FMMO) program. The federal lawsuits essentially argue that organic and conventional milk are treated the same under FMMO regulations even though the production is significantly different. CODE argues that the benefits from FMMO flow almost entirely to conventional producers, even though conventional milk cannot be used in organic production, ultimately disadvantaging organic producers.
Prior to these lawsuits, CODE submitted proposals to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in 2015 that were not successful and presented organic-specific recommendations during the 2023 national FMMO hearing that were not considered.
2008 Investigation
In August 2007, Aurora was sanctioned by the USDA after the agency’s investigators found 14 “willful” violations of federal organic law. Instead of following the recommendations of career civil servants at the agency, that would have decertified Aurora and banned them from participating in organic commerce, Bush administration officials that run the agency placed Aurora on a one-year probation.
The USDA investigation was sparked by several legal complaints filed by Cornucopia documenting numerous organic improprieties from our own onsite visits and investigation of Aurora’s practices.
