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Plant in a Box: A Solution for USDA-Inspected Poultry Processing?

A Niche Meat Processor Assistance Network webinar

Date: February 25, 2016

Time: 1pm Eastern (noon Central, 11am Mountain, 10am Pacific)

Duration: one hour

How to attend: Go to https://connect.extension.iastate.edu/nichemeat 5 to 10 minutes before start time and login as guest (no password needed).

Overview: 

Small-scale poultry producers are well aware that finding USDA-inspected processing is a big challenge.  Very few inspected poultry plants do fee-for-service processing, far fewer than for red meat, largely because it is hard to be profitable.  David Schafer, owner and founder of Featherman Equipment and NMPAN member, may have found a solution. He has built a “Plant in a Box” (PIB) that aims to be a turnkey answer for those looking to process chickens, turkeys and other poultry under USDA-inspection.  The Plant in a Box unit utilizes a recycled shipping container and comes ready to go: all the operator needs is a site pad, water, power, and a plan for effluent.

On this webinar, we’ll hear from John Smith of Maple Wind Farm in Vermont.  Maple Wind Farm is the first farm in the country to own and operate a PIB.  Smith will tell us about how they got started, successes, challenges and surprises along the way, and plans for the future.

We’ll also hear from David Schafer and Greg Gunthorp (of Gunthorp Farms) about how the PIB concept got started and their plans for the future.

Speakers: John Smith from Maple Wind Farm, David Schafer from Featherman Equipment and Greg Gunthorp from Gunthorp Farms

All NMPAN webinars are open to the public and free of charge. To learn about upcoming webinars and view recorded sessions, visit the NMPAN Webinars page.