West Liberty Foods
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 | |
| Company type | Private company |
|---|---|
| Industry | Meat Processing |
| Founded | 1996 in West Liberty, Iowa |
| Headquarters | West Liberty, Iowa |
Key people | Brandon Achen, President and CEO |
| Products | Turkey, Sliced Meats Other meat products |
Number of employees | 1900 (2008) |
| Website | www |
West Liberty Foods, L.L.C. is a farmer-owned food company headquartered in West Liberty, Iowa. Recognized as one of the top-50 protein processors in North America, the company has the capacity to produce over 650 million pounds of food products per year across four facilities. According to the National Provisioner, West Liberty Foods is the 34th-largest meat and poultry processor in the United States.
West Liberty Foods meat and poultry products can be found in grocery stores and restaurant chains nationwide, and has four locations: West Liberty, Iowa; Mount Pleasant, Iowa; Tremonton, Utah; and Bolingbrook, Illinois.
The company primarily provides meat for other marketing brands, producing 90% of its product for customers, while selling only 10% under the West Liberty Foods brand name. In addition to slaughtering turkeys, the company produces prepared beef, chicken, pork, and turkey products.[1] Company revenue has grown rapidly with US$65 million in sales during 1997, $120 million in 2000, and $200 million in 2003.[1][2] Most recently, West Liberty Foods posted $442 million in revenue for 2006,[3] making the company the 56th-largest meat-packing company by sales in the United States.[4] Much of the company's sales come from large nationwide foodservice customers,[5] and as of 2006, was Subway's largest supplier of sliced sandwich meat, providing the franchise with more than 1 million pounds per week.[1] As a result of serving national customers, the company is inspected more than other food manufacturers.[6] Three of West Liberty Foods' plants have been ISO 14001 certified for meeting environmental management standards, and the West Liberty plant was the first turkey-processing plant in the United States to receive this certification.[7]
West Liberty Foods maintains separate facilities for research and development (R&D) and laboratory testing services. They are housed in adjacent buildings several blocks from the plant in West Liberty.[8] The R&D facility includes testing space for both raw and cooked product, and can create test products from start to finish, including initial formulation, final slicing, and packaging.[8] The laboratory conducts product quality testing for the production facilities and uses polymerase chain reaction technology for rapid bacteriological testing.[9] This system can return results within 30 hours of production.[9]
History
Prior to 1996, Louis Rich, the brand name for Oscar Mayer's turkey division, owned the processing plant in West Liberty.[1] In early 1996, Oscar Mayer's parent company, Kraft Foods, announced that they would close the plant that December if no buyer purchased it.[6] The Iowa turkey growers who sold to Kraft discussed purchasing the plant to ensure that demand for their birds remained.[1] In May 1996, 47 of the turkey growers formed the Iowa Turkey Growers Cooperative (ITGC),[1] which purchased the plant from Kraft and took control of it in December.[1] The growers hired meat industry veteran Ken Rutledge to be president and COO of the company.[10] Oscar Mayer helped West Liberty Foods by promising to purchase half of the plant's output in 1997 and a quarter of the output in 1998 to help the startup company.[11]
Production under ITGC ownership began in January 1997.[1] The company faced financial difficulty because the turkey market was oversupplied and prices hit historic lows.[1] While financial projections assumed a price of US$1.92 per pound for turkey, prices averaged $1.46 per pound in 1997.[11] During this time, four of the growers left ITGC.[6] Turkey prices eventually rebounded, and the company was bolstered by sales to Sara Lee near the end of 1998.[1]
Since the rebound, West Liberty Foods’ sales have grown steadily.[1] In 2000, the company acquired a second plant in Sigourney, Iowa, from Pinnacle Foods to meet rising orders. The facility was sold in 2012.[1] The company grew again in April 2003, when it opened a processing plant in Mount Pleasant, Iowa, which was later expanded in 2004.[12] Company leadership changed in 2004, as Ed Garrett was named president and COO when Rutledge resigned to take a position with another growers' organization.[13] In 2006, the company entered into a marketing alliance agreement with Midvale, Utah-based Norbest Foods.[14]
On April 9, 2020, three workers were infected with COVID-19 at the company's plant in West Liberty, resulting in a shutdown until April 14 due to sanitization being done.[15]
Labor episode
In 2004, workers at the West Liberty plant considered joining the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW).[16] On July 1, 2004, the workers voted on whether they would be represented by UFCW Local 431.[16] An initial tally of votes came out 301 in favor and 299 against union representation,[16] but the count did not include 13 ballots that were disputed by UFCW.[16] The ballots were challenged on claims that they were cast by management personnel who would not be union members.[16]
A National Labor Relations Board hearing to confirm or invalidate the vote was scheduled for January 5, 2005, but then postponed until February 16, 2005.[17] On February 1, 2005, the company and UFCW settled their dispute.[18] UFCW withdrew its objections, and West Liberty Foods posted a notice that they would not close the plant or fire workers if employees unionized.[18] This resulted in a final vote count of 303 to 308 against union representation.[18]
UFCW Local 431 held a second vote at the West Liberty plant on July 15, 2005.[19] The vote was 231 to 322 against unionization.[19]
In 2009, the company paid US$58,613.75 to Labor Information Services, an antiunion management services company connected to the Burke Group, to provide consultants who met directly with workers "either individually or in group meetings...regarding union issues."[20]