B & E Meats in Crookston has completed its new beef and pork processing facility expansion. The new facility will be able to bring livestock in for on-site, humane slaughtering and processing.
Owner Brent Epema gave KROX a tour of the new facility, which can process up to 20 cows and 30 pigs per week. Some of the features of the new facility include a 24-hour drive-through unloading zone for farmers to pull their trailers in and unload their animals directly into the chutes.
The expansion was a long and tough process for Epema at times, but he is happy to see the new facility up and running ahead of a busy fall season. “We’ve been working on this expansion for four years, so by the time we put all the planning together, got the financing, and realized we’re doing this about a four-year project,” said Epema. “In the last year, two years, is when we started gaining the most traction, and getting customers lined up and knowing exactly where we were going to go with this, to where we are now.”
Epema has already received positive feedback from farmers and customers about the new facility and its efficiency, from unloading livestock to processing and pick-up. “We had some Scottish Highlanders that came in from Northwoods, North Dakota. So they’re bighorn animals, and are harder to handle,” Epema explained. “That farmer who raised them, we did them so he could sell them to his own customer base. He posted on Facebook, and they’re super happy. They put a post up saying they’ll come back for sure. And like I say, with the drive-through and the way that we handle the animals here, the farmers are way happier. Our customers are way happier, knowing how they’re handled and taken care of.”
Epema worked with consultants, including Dr. Temple Grandin, on the facility’s design, particularly the unloading area and chutes. The curved design of the rails and chutes is more natural for the animals, given their farm life, and makes them calmer and easier to handle. “It changed the whole world,” said Epema. “It changed the whole industry. Doing it on a small scale, like we are, I don’t know if you’re going to find a better, more humane processing facility in northern Minnesota than what we are. Having them in a controlled climate, being able to cool them, and having them be very familiar with what they’re used to when they go down the chutes to their veterinarian pen, it’s identical to what they do on the farm to what we do here.”
The expansion will help Epema and his team increase production to meet community demand and begin selling products online. “A lot of our customers over the last 25 years have been lifelong customers of mine, and they’re raising their kids in the tradition of coming to the local meat plant,” he said. “They’re getting their bacon and knowing what they’re getting. They’re getting their sticks. They’re getting their sausage and their fresh cuts the way that they want them. When they retire, they go down south. A lot of them are recreational. They have lakes up here, so when they’re down south, they miss everything that we have. So our best aspect to get them what they want and show the rest of the country what we have to offer up here in the Midwest is by e-sales. By doing e-sales and being farm fresh, we will do small batches.”
Photos of the new processing facility and a link to the video tour are included below.
