An oceanfront resort in Florida, with a palm tree-dotted theater to the Atlantic Ocean. Golf along the intra-coastal salt marshes, hawks flying overhead and “birdies” dropping below. Drinks at the bar, laughter growing louder with each one. Oh, yes, and the educational content.

Business travel has its perks, and I can relay what everyone at the Chicken Marketing Summit (CMS) in July was saying, which was how nice it was to finally get out in the post-pandemic world and see old and new friends face to face, shake their hands and maybe even hug them.

But as much as we want to wish the pandemic’s impacts away with that ocean breeze, it’s clear — through the stories I heard from others in that paradise setting, and the news unfolding in real life elsewhere — that we are not out of the rough. Use the phrase “post-pandemic” with caution; it doesn’t mean “back to normal.”

More than a lingering effect is a severe shortage of labor, a word repeated from the mouths of processors at CMS like parrots. Supported by stimulus bucks, workers have been less inclined to return to the line. There’s no telling how many ever will, given that the tough work was already an increasingly tough sell pre-pandemic — and there now are plenty of openings elsewhere. A salesman for one of the nation’s leading chicken firms told me staffing levels are down by a third in some of his company’s plants.

It’s no wonder that customers like foodservice operators were telling stories of their struggles in securing product, with fewer hands to process it and the success of the “sandwich wars” combining to sabotage them. They called for improved communication from processors and their sales forces, hoping to reduce the number of unpleasant surprises at the unloading dock. Traditionally focused on operations and throughput, companies are learning to connect those internal dots more tightly and place a higher priority on customers’ needs.

Animal protein processors have powered through the worst of the pandemic, demonstrating their ability to rebound from historic supply chain shocks. They have emerged to enjoy intense demand, and now have ample opportunities to take advantage of the new at-home consumer, who wants to conveniently bring the restaurant experience and quality home. As experts at CMS noted time and again, online ordering and delivery from retail and foodservice are here to stay, as consumers place an increasing premium on saving precious time.

As such trends develop, so do the emergence of variant strains of COVID, which prompted another stock market nosedive in late July; new COVID restriction considerations; and the realization that only half of the nation is fully vaccinated. The struggle isn’t over, and we may never return to the world we came to know as normal before mid-March 2020.

I cannot tell you just how refreshing it was to travel for business again after a 16-month hiatus. But I can tell you why it was so meaningful — it was about people, about being human. With uncertainty ever looming, the value we place on people — and the time we spend with them — increases. That, whatever the next crisis may be, will sustain us as an industry.

Editor's note: This article ran as the Editorial in the August issue of Meatingplace magazine.

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