Friday, April 15, 2022
CapitalPress.com 7
Organic Valley begins rebuilding Oregon creamery damaged in fire
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
McMINNVILLE, Ore.
— One year after a fire
significantly damaged the
Organic Valley creamery in
McMinnville, Ore., a new
and expanded facility is ris-
ing from the ashes.
The country’s larg-
est organic
dairy coop-
erative
announced
it is nearly
finished
with
the
first phase
Mark
of rebuild-
ing, and will
Pfeiffer
hire eight
new employees on May 2 to
resume making nonfat milk
powder at the original plant
site. Fourteen employees are
already back on the job.
“It’s been a long, slow
road,” said Mark Pfeiffer,
vice president of inter-
nal operations for Organic
Valley. “It’s nothing short
of miraculous, where
we’re at.”
Organic Valley acquired
the creamery from another
co-op, the Farmers Coop-
erative Creamery, in 2016.
Fire erupted at the plant on
April 20, 2021, destroy-
ing the 25,000-square-
foot main building. Other
assets — including the
milk dryer, butter churn
and storage tanks — sur-
vived the blaze.
“That was a really big
deal for us,” Pfeiffer said.
“If it had been a total
loss, I’m not sure we’d
be rebuilding anywhere,
quite frankly.”
Before the fire, the
McMinnville
creamery
had 44 employees and
handled approximately 4
million pounds of organic
milk every week to make
butter and milk powder.
Pfeiffer said the co-op
did a supply chain analy-
sis to determine whether
it was feasible to rebuild
in McMinnville, about 45
miles southwest of Port-
Organic Valley
Phase one of rebuilding the Organic Valley creamery in McMinnville, Ore. The co-op plans to hire eight new em-
ployees on May 2.
Amy Hanifan/
McMinnville Fire Department
Firefighters battle the
flames April 20, 2021, at
the Organic Valley Cream-
ery in McMinnville, Ore.
Organic Valley
Work progresses on the Organic Valley creamery in McMinnville, Ore. The co-op will
soon resume making milk powder at the plant.
land in Oregon’s Wil-
lamette Valley. Organic
Valley has 1,700 farm-
er-members, including 69
in Oregon, Washington
and Idaho.
After studying the
farms’
locations
and
trucking routes to deliver
their milk for processing,
Pfeiffer said McMinn-
ville “was close enough to
the epicenter where it just
made sense.”
Groundbreaking
for
phase one of the rebuild
was Oct. 4, 2021.
In
the
meantime,
Pfeiffer said the co-op
arranged co-processing of
members’ milk at other
plants around the North-
west, posing a major logis-
tical challenge.
“The metaphor I would
use is (like) asking a
2-year-old to learn how
to solve a Rubik’s Cube,”
Pfeiffer said. “You’re
dealing with such a per-
ishable commodity. It’s
just very difficult.”
Despite this, Pfeiffer
said the co-op continued
to pick up milk and pay its
members in full.
“One thing we’re very
proud of is that none of our
farmers were ever really
impacted by this,” he said.
The
McMinnville
creamery is one of only
two milk processing plants
owned by the Organic Val-
ley, Pfeiffer said, with the
other being in Wiscon-
sin. The co-op contracts
with co-processing part-
ners to ensure milk stays
as fresh and local as pos-
sible, without having to
travel long distances from
the farm.
Phase one of the rebuild
is estimated to cost $35
million. Crews have con-
structed a new fluid milk
processing room next to
the original milk dryer
and evaporator, which was
unaffected by the fire.
The fire also spared two
50,000-gallon raw milk
silos. Pfeiffer said the new
plant will include an addi-
tional two 40,000-gal-
lon milk silos, as well as
two 30,000-gallon storage
tanks for pasteurized milk
and three 10,000-gallon
cream silos.
Pfeiffer
said
the
increased capacity will
better serve Organic Val-
ley and potentially play a
role in co-processing for
other companies in the
future.
“Not only us, there is
a lot of milk supply in
the Northwest,” he said.
“The processing infra-
structure and supply chain
out there leaves a lot to be
desired.”
The timeline for phase
two of the rebuild remains
uncertain. Pfeiffer said
that effort will priori-
tize employee offices and
potential for renewed
butter production at the
McMinnville
creamery,
though construction costs
have spiked with inflation.
“We anticipate that this
phase will extend into
2023,” he said.
Pfeiffer credited the
city of McMinnville and
local support for making
phase one of the rebuild a
success.
“It’s just been a great
community effort,” he said.
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