Meat+Poultry - November 2018 - 19

at Usinger's taught Fritz the value of appreciating what had
worked in the family business for so many years while learning
the reasons behind how and why things were done the way
they were. In his mid-30s, he took over for his dad as president.
During his tenure at Usinger's, Fritz has seen sweeping
changes in the industry's supply-chain dynamics. Thanks
to widespread consolidation among packers, the practice
of sourcing local products became challenging as many
slaughtering operations shut down. "It requires a little more
forward planning than it used to," he says, because product
now is often shipped from several states away.
With two daughters who have both graduated from
college and work outside the family business, Fritz has
hardly ruled out the possibility of one or both joining the
company someday. One works as an extension specialist
at Iowa State Univ. and the other as a social media guru, so
both have skills that could benefit Usinger's.
For now, though, Fritz is the only family member in
the current generation working at Usinger's. He points
out however, that wasn't always the case. Fritz's older
sister, Debra, worked at the headquarters as director of
retail operations and corporate services before losing a
courageous battle with cancer about five years ago.

NEW DIGS
While developing the wish list for the new plant, one of the
main goals was to facilitate efficiency.
"We needed a place that we could have a more spread
out, single-level manufacturing facility," he says. "To have a
clean sheet of paper and be able to design it how you want it
was like nirvana," Fritz says.
Today, operations include one full shift and a partial
shift and usually operations are five days per week, but
occasionally six days depending on seasonal demand.
Separate employee lunch rooms are in each of the three
newer buildings and two more are in the old facility. Fritz
points out that food is provided free of charge to workers at
each of the lunch rooms. "Everybody eats our product twice
a day," he says.
Walking through the RTE facility, Fritz points out, "this is
the most critical area because at this point the product has
been cooked," and any contamination just before packaging
would create a food safety problem. A wall divides the
adjoining packaging room to the boxing area, where finished
products are conveyed through small openings in the wall.
During a typical shift, about 35 different items are packaged.
"Each day of the week, each line is set up to run a
different configuration," Fritz says of the batch processing.
Logistics plays a significant role in streamlining production
to minimize the number and extent of interruptions while
still accommodating the wide range of products. "We try
to keep changeovers to a minimum," he says, but it is an
unavoidable and necessary inconvenience.

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Meat+Poultry - November 2018

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