US-based feed blender expands production, footprint
The Minnesota-based spray drying and feed blending company announced that it would be expanding production facilities with a new site in South Dakota earlier this winter. The company currently distributes finished products to more than 40 countries.
The new production facility is intended to help address continued year-over-year growth, said Quintin Honerman, president and general manager with Great Plains Processing.
“We are at the point that our year-over-year growth requires a new facility to maintain our forecasted growth pattern,” he told FeedNavigator. “The new plant will also position GPP for disaster recovery.”
Along with addressing continued growth in market for the company’s products, the new facility is expected to help it reach new regions and expand its product offering, he said.
“This will allow us to not only diversify our portfolio, but to expand our customer base into other market segments as well,” said Honerman. “For example, the pet and aquaculture industries.”
Additionally, the location offers space for more than the initial expansion of production, he said. It is, “a location within a strong ag community and rail access – and the additional bonus of extra land for our forecasted growth,” he added.
Facility details
The Yankton, South Dakota site was selected as it offered scope for product and ingredient transportation, said Honerman. The location offers the needed space for growth, access to rail lines and is close to the interstate.
The new also facility will allow for an expanded production of the company’s feed supplements, he said.
“Our focus is to continue manufacturing premium specialty animal and pet food supplements as a toll or contract manufacturer and launch our own GPP-branded product lines,” he said.
Among the products to be generated there will be Great Plains Processing’s specialty protein product line Pro+, he said. Other animal and pet food supplements that will be made there are still be determined based on consumer interest.
In addition to custom work and its protein-source feed supplement aimed at use in animal feed and aquaculture feeds, the company produces products intended to add butyric acid to animal feed, according to GPP.
The new location reportedly includes a 40,000 square foot building and about 20 acres of property. The facility is set to open the new manufacturing facility by the middle of 2018, the company reported.
In the first year of operation the company is expecting to produce about 7,000 metric tons of finished product, said Honerman.
“We hope to have many will call customers but are not going to limit ourselves to the region,” he said. “We currently ship products domestically and internationally into over 40 countries worldwide.”
