(EBV). These statistical methods influenced the artificial insemination stud rankings used in the United States. These early statistical methods are confused with the BLUP now common in livestock breeding.

The actual term BLUP originated out of work at the University of Guelph in Canada by Daniel Sorensen and Brian Kennedy, in which they extended Henderson's results to a model that includes several cycles of selection. This model was popularized by the University of Guelph in the dairy industry