Meadowbrook Farms Prepares Groundwork for New $25 Million Hog Processing Plant in Illinois

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Researched by Industrialinfo.com (Industrial Information Resources, Incorporated; Houston, Texas). An Illinois cooperative made up of over 250 area family farms, Meadowbrook Farms Incorporated (Belleville, Illinois), has started preliminary site work and groundbreaking for a new $25 million hog processing plant in Rantoul, Illinois.

The project has been in the works since early 2000, but the company had many sites under consideration until the Rantoul site was approved and the announcement was made public late last year.

The Facility Group Incorporated (Smyrna, Georgia) has been selected to provide turn-key process planning, equipment selection, procurement, and construction management services for this state-of-the-art 400 head per hour hog slaughter, case ready, and further processing plant.

Plans are to construct a 90,000 square foot production building with the latest technology in kill floor robotics, carcass evaluation, and data collection systems that will deliver high quality and value added pork products like fresh sausage and case ready pork.

The 40-acre site in Rantoul is located about 110 miles south of Chicago in the Champaign/Urbana area of Illinois.

Meadowbrook hopes to have the building structure enclosed by winter and following 13 months of construction activity, operations should begin at the plant by the fall of 2003.

The operation will initially employ about 200 people, and is designed to expand and support a second shift in the future.

Meadowbrook Farms Incorporated was once the managing company for the American Premium Foods Incorporated cooperative, until in June of this year the two companies merged into one. The bacon, chops, and other pork products produced at the plant will marketed under the Meadowbrook Farms brand name.