Meat + Poultry - April 2009 - 48

BUTTERBALL

"Needless to say, we're very pleased
with the results of the acquisition," says
Keith Shoemaker, CEO of Butterball. A
native of Statesville, N.C., in the Tar Heel
state's foothills, Shoemaker began working in the turkey industry at the age of
13 and has spent his entire professional
life in the poultry
business. Now 58
years old, the Butterball executive
believes the merging of the company and the brand
brought together the strengths
Shoemaker
of two different
kinds of operations to form the best and
most efﬁcient kind of company possible
in the poultry industry.
"When you look back now at the acquisition of the brand, the steps we took
to bring these two organizations together formed something new and different,"
Shoemaker points out. "We combined
Butterball - a top brand in the poultry
world and certainly the top turkey name
in the world, period - and Carolina Turkey, not a brand name at all, but a big
commodity producer. Butterball was a
natural product and deli-branded, and

Carolina Turkey was essentially heavily involved in private labeling. So there
was no crossover, but instead a brand
new organization," he says. "It was a
great accomplishment, and we're very
pleased with how the company is operating," Shoemaker says.

Photo courtesy of Butterball LLC

The result is a company employing
6,000 people throughout eight plants
and corporate ofﬁce locations, processing 1.4 billion lbs. of turkey a year, with
annual sales exceeding $1.4 billion. The
company also operates breeder, growing and research farms, diagnostic labs,
feed mills, hatcheries and has contractgrowing operations.

'Home' advantage
The Butterball chief believes there is
an advantage to having the company
headquartered in a single corporate
ofﬁce in Garner. All the employees in
the headquarters were brought together to be involved in what turned out
to be a smooth transition. As a result,
some of the most-talented people in
the industry are currently working
together, ofﬁcials say. The company
continues to grow and become even
better, they believe.
Shoemaker says one of the company's great strengths is pursuing
knowledge to make the best turkey
products possible, and using the talents of its employees, including management, sales people, ofﬁce staff and
hourly employees.
He believes the team assembled
in Garner and at the company's other plant locations work well together.
"Even when we do something wrong,
like making a judgment that's not the
best, we learn from it," he says.
Has that happened in the Carolina Turkey-Butterball combination? "If
you're asking me if we got payback
from bringing the two organizations
together, the answer is 'yes.' For one

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April 2009

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Meat + Poultry - April 2009

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