Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Company offers guaranteed shackle space at Mills County plant

Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Company has announced its intention to sell guaranteed shackle space for 10 years at its planned 1,500-head-per - day beef-processing facility in northwest Mills County in an effort to provide pricing stability for independent cattle producers in western Iowa, eastern Nebraska, southeastern South Dakota, northwestern Missouri, northeastern Kansas and southwestern Minnesota. The facility has been proposed for a parcel of land northwest of the Interstate 29-Highway 370 interchange.
“A daunting problem for beef producers, even after they’ve sold their livestock to a processor, has been the inability to know definitively what day their cattle will be accepted for harvest. All too often, that problem leads to added costs and reduced profits or even a loss for producers,” said Chad Tentinger, the project’s lead developer and a fourth-generation cattle producer. “Because a true producer-processor partnership and a mutually beneficial relationship are the cornerstone and foundation of the Cattlemen’s Heritage business model, we know that our shackle space program is a win-win for everyone involved.”
According to a Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Company press release, producers will be able to place a deposit of $50 per shackle. Within 30 days of the company’s construction loan closing, a final payment of $200 per shackle would be required. Following the plant opening, which is tentatively scheduled for the first quarter of 2024, producers would receive a $50 payout per delivery on each shackle that they have reserved. The $50 annual payout would be in effect for 10 years, generating $500 in revenue over the life of the agreement.
“Obviously, that’s a two-to-one return on each shackle, which will help family farmers earn a better return on every head of livestock that they process through the Cattlemen’s Heritage facility,” Tentinger said.
Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Company noted that recent news reports indicate that 98% of marketable meat processed in the U.S. comes from “a mere 50 facilities.” When pandemic-related plant closings were exacerbated by other crises, including fires and cyberattacks, states and the U.S. Department of Agriculture launched a range of efforts to encourage additional shackle space, the press release stated.
Trade organizations, including the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, have promoted a number of incentives to increase the amount and diversity of shackle space as well as competition within the processing industry.
Cattlemen’s Heritage Beef Company is a corporation led by Tentinger, founder and owner of Ten Corp Inc., and an Iowa cattle producer. Tentinger hopes to provide a market for cattle raised by smaller, independent cattle producers. In June 2021, the company announced its plans to build the $325 million beef processing facility in Mills County. The plant is projected to employ up to 750 workers.