With the goal of becoming a niche packer, the estimated $550 million Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Co. aims to process an estimated 2,000 head per day at its 132-acre site in northern Mills County.

Karis Capital out of Florida has invested $150 million in the innovative processing plant that’s utilizing European technology and will have an on-site daycare, bank for cashing paychecks and medical center. The plant will have a workforce of up to 800 people working a single shift and aims to break ground late summer-early fall.

Chad Tentinger, chief executive officer of Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Co., said it’s a tragedy that so many producers lost their operations during the farm crisis. With the new processing plant, he aims to bring back upwards of 400 family farms to the state of Iowa.

“All our feedstuffs are grown in Iowa within 10 miles from the plant and the manure goes back onto that ground. In the South, they’re running out of water and railing in corn and forage from thousands of miles away, which is expensive and a carbon footprint,” Tentinger said. “We have the ability to get to a zero footprint.”

Technology Cattlemen’s Heritage will be using includes an algae-based wastewater treatment system to capture and offset thousands of tons of carbon dioxide each year. The nitrogen and phosphorus will be converted into fertilizer that will be applied to the fields from where the plant pulls its feed.

“We laid out the plant for maximized efficiency and then put a box around it. It’s a different way of doing things — the technology will be new to the U.S. but has been used for 20 years in New Zealand and Europe. I issued a mandate to the designers and engineers that the technology must be fully vetted, proven and consistent because we can’t afford to be down,” Tentinger said.

When choosing the site for the new plant, the Cattlemen’s Heritage leadership team brought in Don Baske, an expert in finding the perfect sites for food processing plants. They wanted to be located in the Midwest and Baske found the Mills County site that’s already zoned for this type of project, near major transportation avenues and a viable workforce.

“Starting salaries will be $55,000 plus benefits. So we’ll have a husband and wife with kids who can come to the plant to work and use the daycare that will be in a separate building outside.

“We’ll have on-site healthcare and the ability to cash checks onsite. A family can make $110,000 plus benefits, know that their kids can go to work with them, be picked up at the plant for school and during the summer walk over and take their breaks with the kids,” Tentinger said. “We want to create long-term employees with a great family culture here. Our break rooms are designed to look like upscale cafes with windows. We want our employees to be happy and come to work happy to be a part of this team.”

Leaders plan to have the plant up and running within 18 months, a goal that’s aided by the fact the plant is being built during the cattle cycle at a point where the herd is rebuilding and the plant will come into full capacity just ahead of the height of the herd.

“If history runs true, we’ll be opening up in the eight-year stretch of building up the herd,” Tentinger said.

Cattlemen’s Heritage also has formed the Legacy Beef Co-op, which allows farmers to buy shares in the co-op that delivers cattle to the plant. They’ll own up to 20 percent of the Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Co. plant and operations.

“Every farmer that feeds cattle today should be looking at getting in on this. It’s true ownership in a processing plant, so when you sell your cattle, you’ll have fairer pricing. We’ll have a profit coming off the cattle coming in now, and then a fairer pricing structure as the plant makes money and the farmers have the opportunity to share in the profits on a back side that’s never happened in beef before,” Tentinger said. “This is about bringing the producer closer to the consumer.”

So far, the plant’s leadership team has been contacted by 80 companies to buy the product yet to be produced at Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Co.

“Instead of buying from someone else, buy from us. The big four packers are moving 25% of the beef in the country on a daily basis, and we’ll be focusing on 1.5 percent of the beef traded per day. It’ll all be sold before we even start,” Tentinger said. “The cattle producers we’ve spoken with have all been positive. This business model isn’t because we need a plant; it’s because we want a fair pricing mechanism and enable producers to share in the profits. This plant is a necessity for us to get that.”

Iowa’s economy also will benefit from this plant. It has the potential to make a $1.1 billion economic impact, which Tentinger said is “significant.”

“When you include ancillary jobs, we will see 3,400 jobs created in Iowa and Nebraska,” Tentinger said.

Tentinger plans to remain CEO of Cattlemen’s Heritage as long as he continues to have industry experts at the helm alongside him.

The fourth-generation cattle farmer actively farms in northwestern Iowa with his dad and brother on ground that’s been in the family since the late 1800s. The men each have their own operations but work together.

His daughter Kristin also works with him at TenCorp and Cattlemen’s Heritage. TenCorp builds cattle facilities across the country. Kristin Tentinger also is starting to feed cattle on her own, he said.

“If I don’t have the right controller and the right senior sales on board, I will happily step aside for another CEO who can be a hands-on manager,” Tentinger said. “Kristin is an active part of the management team and it’s a lot of fun bringing a kid into the business.”

Lee Schulz, Iowa State University Extension beef economist, said that in 2016, it was estimated that daily slaughter capacity was less than 25% of the daily fed cattle production in the state.

“Cattle slaughter and beef processing contribute significantly to the economy. A lack of slaughter and processing facilities for fed cattle represents a lost opportunity in Iowa’s economy,” Schulz said.

“New plants like Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Company strategically locating near Glenwood, Iowa, could lead to narrower spreads between fed cattle prices and beef prices if the plant is able to operate at least as efficiently in terms of marginal costs as existing nearby plants. This is directly relevant for current policy discussions because on Jan. 3, 2022, the White House announced that it would be allocating $1 billion to expand ‘independent’ meat and poultry processing capacity in the United States,” Schulz added.

“According to the fact sheet released by the White House, the additional slaughter capacity will result in ‘better earnings for producers.'”