PAGE 4 • HERMISTON HERALD/EAST OREGONIAN
SATURDAY, JANUARY 10, 2015
PENDLETON & HERMISTON
WHERE THE SAUSAGE IS MADE
Hill Meat plans
expansion,
upgrades near
Pendleton airport
BY PHIL WRIGHT
EO MEDIA GROUP
The whiff of smoked pork
drifts from Hill Meat Co.
atop Airport Hill in Pendle-
ton, hinting at the hot dogs,
sausages and bacon curing
inside. The family-owned
and operated business has
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goods since 1947, but the
focus is on the future.
Jim Cheney has the title
of Hill Meat CEO, but he
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Sorensen, is the president
and real show runner. They
revealed Tuesday the com-
pany is in the engineering
phases to add 20,000 square
feet of manufacturing space
to the plant, and to give the
60-plus-year-old building
a big makeover, including
lowering the ceilings and
removing walls, install-
ing better lighting and im-
proved refrigeration.
The project will cost
millions, they said, but the
engineers predict the larger
plant will use less energy than
today, and more space will
make it easier to add new pro-
duction lines.
“It seems like we’re burst-
ing at the seams all the time,”
Sorensen said.
The renovation also will
eliminate maintenance prob-
lems with the aging structure,
she said, and her father point-
ed out it means Hill Meat can
stay well above federal in-
spection standards.
“We want to be on the top
side, not barely hanging on,”
Cheney said.
E.J. HARRIS PHOTO
Employees make kielbasa on Wednesday at the Hill Meat Company in Pendleton.
The company, which now
has about 80 employees,
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ruin, Cheney said, when he
assumed ownership in 2001.
Right away, Cheney made
changes. For one, Hill Meat
stopped selling products out
the front door. Cheney said
that made no sense when the
company also wanted goods
in grocery stores.
And he said Hill Meat
used to handle its own dis-
tribution, sending delivery
trucks to 40 or 50 places over
two- or three-day trips. That
was a lot of miles and bills of
sale. So Cheney said he built
partnerships with distribution
warehouses that also once
viewed Hill Meat as competi-
tion. The move cut deliveries
to two or three stops in a day,
while getting more Hill Meat
products out there.
Hill Meat for several years
sold most of its goods through
the food service industry, dis-
tributors such as Sysco, or
through restaurant and hotel
chains, including McMenam-
ins brew pubs and Red Lion
hotels. Sorensen said that in
the past couple of years the
company has worked hard
to get products into grocery
stores, and has had success
with independently owned
stores such as Roth’s Fresh
Markets, Red Apple and
Albertson’s. The company
brought a marketing special-
ist to gain better representa-
tion in the independent gro-
cery market, and today, she
said, Hill Meat has about a
50-50 split between retail and
food service.
Hill Meat also has been
able to sell products into cor-
porate grocers, such as Safe-
way, but those have more red
tape before a product can hit
the shelves. Cheney said Al-
bertson’s buying Safeway
stores last year likely will
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year.
Developing the retail mar-
ket also came about because
of a $10 million investment
the company made a few
years ago in equipment to
maintain and improve consis-
tency. Quality is subjective,
Cheney said, but consistency
matters.
Sorensen said Hill Meat
also revamped packaging
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products contain quality pro-
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vatives and are gluten- and
allergen-free. Most Hill Meat
goods have been that way for
years, she said, but customers
want to see that on the label.
Sorensen said late 2013
was the last time Hill Meat
made a product that contained
unlabeled allergens, such as
soy or peanut dust. Unlabeled
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of food recalls in the U.S. for
goods that fall under the eye
of the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration. Why would
any company want that kind
of headache, Sorensen said.
Social media is another
new arena Hill Meat entered
in late 2014 with a Facebook
page. So far, there’s just 445
likes. And it goes dog-in-bun
with a new company website.
Hill Meat’s growth and in-
novation, though, have roots
in the old-fashioned notion
of keeping business part-
ners happy. That sometimes
means sticking another com-
pany’s name on a Hill Meat
product.
“We feel it is a partner-
ship,” Sorensen said. “If we
can help them grow their
business, it will help us.”
And sometimes it means
literally going the distance.
Cheney recalled a compa-
ny on the Mexico border ran
out of Hill Meat bacon, so he
drove 18 hours to make the
delivery.
Shearer’s expansion creates more opportunities
$4M project brings
more jobs in
Hermiston
BY SEAN HART
EO MEDIA GROUP
A new expansion brought
new employees and new
growth at Shearer’s Foods in
Hermiston in 2014.
On Jan. 15, 2014, the po-
tato and tortilla chip manu-
facturer began a $4 million
expansion to be able to make
cooked corn tortilla chips
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May 25, Plant Manager Paul
Chapman said.
The plant was already
creating tortilla chips from
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provided the opportunity to
cater to new manufacturing
customers who wanted chips
prepared in a more tradition-
al style, he said. By adding
cooking kettles and soaking
kettles, Shearer’s can now
cook, soak and mill raw corn,
he said.
“A key part here has been
being able to go out and bring
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tomers that want that kind of
product,” Chapman said. “It
has increased the business,
and it has also increased our
potential for more business.”
He said Shearer’s is a
co-manufacturer that creates
chips for a variety of brands,
EO MEDIA GROUP FILE PHOTO
A worker at the Shearer’s Foods processing plant outside Hermiston inspects potato chips
before they are packaged for distribution. The business completed a $4 million expansion in
2014, which will allow it to serve more customers this year.
including store labels. With
the new capability, Chapman
said the company has attract-
ed new customers because
they can get all of their de-
sired products from one plant.
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brand new customer that’s
going to be starting up in a
month,” he said. “They’re
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west. They’re going to get
potato chips and cooked corn
tortilla chips.”
The plant increased its
production volume last year
and plans to further increase
it by 15 percent this year, he
said. The additional volume
has allowed the plant to run
the tortilla chip production
lines closer to their maximum
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cy and requiring additional
employees, Chapman said.
“Obviously, from a man-
ufacturing point of view, you
want to utilize your assets
24/7,” he said. “Being able
to do cooked corn tortilla
chips has allowed us to run
the lines during days that we
had capacity that we did not
have the business. We have
brought in about an addition-
al 30 to 35 new associates on
top of where we were.”
Prior to the expansion,
Chapman said Shearer’s em-
ployed about 310 people, and
employee numbers will prob-
ably grow to 350 or more
as business continues to in-
crease. He said the plant still
has about 20 percent more ca-
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chip lines.
“We are looking for good
people,” he said. “Most peo-
ple come in and start as pack-
ers, but I have two supervisors
here that started as packers.
They came off the street at a
low level and worked hard.”
Chapman said Shear-
er’s, which began in Ohio,
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plants in 2014 with plans for
continued growth. People can
apply at shearers.com.
Although the ConAgra
Lamb Weston facility in
Hermiston and Hermiston
Foods did not expand in 2014,
both made infrastructure up-
dates, representatives said.
“We had no line expan-
sions or added jobs in 2014,
but our facility in Hermiston
is an integral part of our op-
eration, and we continued to
invest in the facility in 2014,
making infrastructure up-
dates to the plant,” ConAgra
spokesman Shelby Stoolman
said in an email.
Hermiston Foods Gener-
al Manager Trent Waldern
said the business celebrat-
ed its 25th year in operation
in 2014, which through the
years “has necessitated re-
placement and upgrades in
our plant equipment and in-
frastructure.”
He said 2014 was an av-
erage year, but the weather
was better than 2013, help-
ing local growers achieve the
yields necessary to meet pro-
jected sales volumes. He said
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cant staff turnover each year
and, like other local seasonal
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attract new employees.”
Waldern did, however,
commend local growers for
adapting with the company.
“Our local contract grow-
ers have done a good job
of working with us to meet
our crop needs and adapt to
changes in those needs,” Wal-
dern said.
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