It’s been encouraging to see all the efforts during the past year to get more small meat processing plants up and running. If you’ve been reading the Meatingplace daily news feeds, no doubt you’ve seen the stories of many states and the USDA allocating funds and resources to help small plants start up or expand.

Yes, many of these plants are small, but even small plants provide a valuable regional service.

During this past crazy COVID year, I’ve fielded dozens upon dozens of calls and emails from beef producers all over the U.S. who are looking for a small slaughter facility close to their ranches where they can send their market-ready cattle. In many areas, finding a plant for 5-to-50 head of cattle is hard. Some plants are booked out for over a year. Others have some room for a few head at a time, but not full truckloads of cattle.

Because of this, cattle are often loaded on trucks and hauled more than a thousand miles away to be processed. Not only is this hard on the cattle, but it’s expensive.

Small plant challenges

Among the many issues I’d like to address with blogs this year regarding small plants, a few important issues are: packaging, food safety, temperatures, cold-chain, interventions and labeling. Can you think of others?

For this edition, I’d like to address the inferior packaging machines found at many small plants. Often, when I visit some small state-inspected plants, I can’t believe what I see them doing with their packaging.

Regarding packaging equipment, it’s expensive to buy the modern roll-stock vacuum packing machines that package beautiful packaging that consumers want and deserve. But packaging beef in cheap imported pouches and using an old flip-flop vacuum sealer that needs new seal bars and a new vacuum pump just doesn’t cut it.

Last week I visited a local rancher who had a pallet of fresh beef cuts for sale from a current fabrication. The beef wasn’t graded but it was beautifully marbled, had great color and was trimmed decently. It would have been fairly easy for me to buy and sell this beef, except for the crappy-looking pouches. More than half were leakers. Purge from the pouches had leaked through the bottom of the boxes and the boxes were soggy. I checked a pallet of frozen beef he had in the freezer. About 20% of the pouches were leakers and there was white frost on the insides many of the bags. That’s not a good way to sell.

I asked the beef producer why he didn’t demand the use of high-quality shrink bags for his beautiful beef. He had nowhere else to go for his five head of cattle. This state-run plant he found was his only option within 800 miles. The plant doesn’t have a shrink tunnel or a modern vacuum sealer. “Beggars can’t be choosers,” he said.

I really think the USDA needs to hire an expert packaging consultant that can visit these small plants, old and new, and consult with them on the industry standards and best practices for packaging, food safety, proper temps and interventions. I also think the USDA should offer easy-to-apply-for grants and micro-loans for small plants that can be used for purchasing new packaging equipment.

For cut steaks and grinds, freezer paper looks terrible. Yes, I know, it holds up well if used correctly, but just try speed-thawing a pound of ground beef that’s been wrapped in freezer paper in cold water.

Every small plant needs to have a roll stock vacuum sealer for steaks, roasts and grinds. For sub-primals, they need to be packed with high quality shrink bags that go through a shrink tunnel before going into boxes.

I know this seems so elementary, but you’d be surprised to see what goes to the marketplace coming out of these small plants. They are trying hard, and most really want to improve their operations, but with the slim margins and ever-increasing operating costs, they just don’t have the funds to improve their equipment.

Let’s advocate on behalf of the small plant processors to those who can help, like the USDA and state agencies. They could use some wider advocacy and help with upgrades. Let’s strengthen the weak links in our industry!

Packaging challenges at small processing plants

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