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| Post Number: 11
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cwolff 
Group: Members
Posts: 265
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 04 2003,9:46 pm |
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If you think your lakes are polluted now, the hog slaughtering plant would of greatly added to the problem. The hog slaughtering plant in Worthington discharges enough phosphorus per day to produce over 180,000 pounds of algae per day. That is over 90 tons of algae per day. The plant currently discharges phosphorus at a rate of about 30 parts per million. Not only do these types of plants bring in low paying jobs, but they will expedite pollution within your watershed, and I bet your city would of given them a tax break besides. Then when the slaughtering plant abruptly leaves town for the next tax incentive, guess who has to clean up the polluted mess left behind?
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| Post Number: 12
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minnow
Unregistered
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Posted on: Sep. 04 2003,9:56 pm |
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Have you been talking to Rick Hoffman? LOL 
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| Post Number: 13
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cwolff
Group: Members
Posts: 265
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 04 2003,9:57 pm |
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who is Rick Hoffman?
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| Post Number: 14
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MADDOG
Group: Moderator
Posts: 7821
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 05 2003,8:19 am |
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cwulff, Hoffman was once the CEO for Seaboard when they were here and is now head of Premium Pork. Check beginning of thread for more.
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Actually my wife is especially happy when my google check arrives each month. Thanks to douchbags like you, I get paid just for getting you worked up. -Liberal
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| Post Number: 15
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MADDOG
Group: Moderator
Posts: 7821
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 10 2003,9:05 am |
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Today's St Joe's news press:
Wednesday, September 10, 2003
Pork firm's CEO details background
By SUSAN MIRES
susanm@npgco.com
Premium Pork is not his first start-up venture, Rick Hoffman told the Young Executives Network on Tuesday morning.
Mr. Hoffman, chief executive officer of Premium Pork, said when he joined Seaboard Corp. in 1983, it had no domestic operations. He helped launch its shipping and poultry business and in 1990 started Seaboard’s pork operation.
“We put together one of the largest pork systems in the industry,” Mr. Hoffman said.
Now, he hopes to replicate that success with Premium Pork, which announced plans in July to build a $130 million processing plant and corporate headquarters in St. Joseph’s stockyards area. Meeting with the Young Executives Network at the St. Joseph Area Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Hoffman gave an update on the company’s activities and also shared some of the challenges in starting a new company.
After leaving Seaboard Farms in 2001, Mr. Hoffman served as president of American Dairy Brands, which produces Borden Dairy products. He said he was approached by a group of about 40 hog producers with the prospect of starting a new processing business.
“I don’t know why, but I told them I’d do it for them,” Mr. Hoffman said.
The group didn’t start out with the idea of building a plant in St. Joseph, he said, but hoped to buy the pork assets from bankrupt Farmland Foods.
“About six months ago, we decided the assets we were looking at were overvalued,” he said. “As a result, we decided to look somewhere else.”
Premium Pork scoped out sites in Albert Lea, Minn., and Omaha, Neb. But St. Joseph’s infrastructure, work force and general atmosphere made the company decide to locate here.
“St. Joseph offered a lot of quality-of-life issues we think are important to a top-quality company,” Mr. Hoffman said.
Transportation also was critical. The hogs will be trucked in from farms in Iowa, Minnesota and Nebraska and the finished pork shipped out to points south and along both coasts.
Premium Pork’s goal is not to produce a well-known grocery brand, Mr. Hoffman said.
“The branded food product is a thing of the past because of Wal-Mart and what Wal-Mart has done to the retail food business,” he said. “You need to be lean and mean to make money today.”
The company will turn out a broad range of pork products, such as fully cooked slabs of ribs and meat ready for the grill, Mr. Hoffman told the group. One-quarter of Premium Pork’s products will be shipped overseas, primarily to Japan, and Japanese inspectors will be at the plant in St. Joseph.
Only about 100 workers of the company’s expected total work force of 1,000 will be involved in slaughtering hogs. The rest will work on finishing products, Mr. Hoffman said.
He also gave an update on construction. Premium Pork recently purchased the Deffenbaugh site for $1.5 million. It has options or contracts on all other property, with the deals to close after the tax-increment-financing district is finalized. The public hearing on the district will be Sept. 18.
Demolition of the old Monfort plant and the Deffenbaugh buildings will begin this fall and take three to five months.
“We’re trying to position ourselves so when we get into the March or April time frame we can start construction,” Mr. Hoffman said.
The plant will come on line in the summer of 2005 with an initial work force of 375, then grow within two years to employ 1,000.
Mr. Hoffman also shared that the project is financed at $160 million and said U.S. Bank is one of its financial institutions.
“I think the project is going to have a very big impact,” Mr. Hoffman said. “I don’t think you can put this size of project in any community and not have a big impact.”
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Actually my wife is especially happy when my google check arrives each month. Thanks to douchbags like you, I get paid just for getting you worked up. -Liberal
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| Post Number: 16
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hoosier
Group: Members
Posts: 1476
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 10 2003,9:56 am |
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O yes, that industry sure had a big impact on AL.
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The power of accurate obsvervation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.
George Bernard Shaw
The devil begins with froth on the lips of an angel entering into battle for a holy and just cause. Grigory Pomerants
We have crossed the boundary that lies between Republic and Empire. Garet Garrett
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| Post Number: 17
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Ole1kanobe
Group: Members
Posts: 1360
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 10 2003,10:06 am |
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You can't set of a nuclear device without having a big impact either, but would you really want it done in oyur town?
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The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it.
-Albert Einstein-
Some of what is said here (myself included) is about as tolerable as listening to someone vacuum a cat.
-nphilbro-
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| Post Number: 18
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Bubba
Group: Members
Posts: 94
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 17 2003,5:49 pm |
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Found this in the News-Press, St. Joseph, MO
Wednesday, September 17, 2003
Premium Pork owners reveal details of financing
By SUSAN MIRES
susanm@npgco.com
The owners of Premium Pork say the $130 million processing plant they plan to build in St. Joseph is actually a small investment.
The secretive owners made their first visible appearance in St. Joseph Tuesday. They represent some of the largest hog production businesses in the United States with combined fixed assets of $750 million.
“There is such a significant investment in the production of pigs already, the plant is a small investment,” said Bob Christensen, chairman of Premium Pork’s board of directors.
He operates Christensen Farms of Sleepy Eye, Minn., which owns 94,000 sows and has 600 employees.
Premium Pork’s owners, all of whom are hog producers, have put up $60 million of their own money for the project. The remainder of the project is financed by lending institutions.
The eight directors, plus Chief Executive Officer Rick Hoffman, met with business and government officials at an invitation-only reception Tuesday evening. Prior to the meeting, they met with the News-Press editorial board.
The group said they decided to build their own processing plant because it has become more and more difficult to turn a profit raising pigs. However, the owners believe their expertise will give them an advantage competing against meat-packing giants such as Tyson and Smithfield Foods that operate their own hog farms.
“All we focus on is raising pigs and raising pigs darn well,” Mr. Christensen said.
Premium Pork plans to compete head to head on a price level with other pork companies by selling to grocery chains. About a quarter of the meat will be exported to Japan.
“We’re looking at low-cost, efficient production and efficient processing,” said Baxter Gutknecht with Hanor Co., based in Spring Green, Wis., with hog operations in several states.
The directors said their tight-lipped approach to the project so far is an indication of how Premium Pork will operate.
“That tells you it will be owned by a group of farmers, but it will be run like a business and professionally operated,” Mr. Christensen said.
The hog-slaughtering plant will be built in the stockyards area and eventually employ about 1,000 people. The company plans to close on all property by the end of October, Mr. Hoffman said, and begin construction in the spring.
The Tax Increment Financing Commission will hold a public hearing at 5 p.m. Thursday to discuss economic incentives for the company.
Premium Pork’s owners also made another attempt to eliminate suspicion that the group may be linked to Seaboard Farms or may make a deal in the future.
“It’s not for sale. No other packer has any money in the plant,” said Myrl Mortenson, who is also with Hanor Co.
It’s not surprising that Premium Pork would appear similar to Seaboard or Premium Standard Farms of Princeton, Mo., because those companies are industry leaders they would like to imitate, Mr. Christensen said.
Together, the owners of Premium Pork own about 5 percent of the hogs in the United States. The farms all will maintain separate operations, but genetics and nutrition will be coordinated to produce a uniform pork product, Mr. Mortenson said.
One of the members of Premium Pork is Allied Producers Co-op, a cooperative of smaller and medium-sized farms in Nebraska, Kansas and Missouri. Members of the co-op have committed 435,000 hogs to the new company.
The co-op had been looking to invest in a processing plant for some time, said Gerald Schmidt of Jansen, Neb., who represents the group on the Premium Pork board of directors.
“This is the first project that after 31/2 years made financial sense,” Mr. Schmidt said.
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| Post Number: 19
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Bubba
Unregistered
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Posted on: Sep. 17 2003,9:09 pm |
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Maddog, sorry I didn't see that you had already posted the article. I was so excited when I found this in my e-mails that I didn't go back and check if anyone had already posted it.
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| Post Number: 20
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MADDOG
Group: Moderator
Posts: 7821
Joined: Aug. 2003
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Posted on: Sep. 18 2003,8:31 am |
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Bubba, mine was a Sept 10th article. Hadn't checked out the news_press for a few days. GOOD JOB!
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Actually my wife is especially happy when my google check arrives each month. Thanks to douchbags like you, I get paid just for getting you worked up. -Liberal
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