What started in 1959 as a co-operative among local agricultural producers and farms has grown into one of the largest pork processors in the world.
“It’s really been a remarkable ride,” said Jim Sbarro, Kansas City, Mo.-based Farmland Foods’ President and Chief Executive Officer. “It started with a pretty simple goal—to bring the best of the heartland’s pork to the rest of the country—and has now become a thriving business that reaches millions of people through our retail and foodservice products.”
Fifty years ago, Farmland Industries, owned by 1,700 co-ops representing over 600,000 agricultural producers, began its foray into the pork business with the purchase of a struggling plant in Denison, Iowa and the launch of the “Farmbest” label. Within a few years, the company added additional processing facilities in Iowa Falls and Eagle Grove, Iowa; Garden City and Hutchinson, Kansas; Cheraw, Colorado; and swine testing stations in both Iowa and Nebraska.
Farmland Foods, a subsidiary of the co-op, was officially launched in 1970 and began producing ham, sausage and bacon marketed under the Farmbest, Country Manor and Farm-King labels. The next two decades saw significant growth, as Farmland added a canning plant in Carroll, Iowa and a hog processing plant in Crete, Nebraska, and by 1989, Farmland was the nation’s tenth largest pork producer.
The company continued to expand throughout the 1990s. In 2002, however, parent company Farmland Industries encountered some economic troubles. The following year, Farmland Foods was purchased by Smithfield Foods (Smithfield, Va.). Since that transition in 2003, Farmland Foods has strengthened its brand.
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