Operators of the Golden Crisp Premium Foods facility in Sioux Center announced a 13-and-a-half million-dollar expansion Tuesday. Bill Otis is the president and chief operating officer of Cudahy Foods Incorporated, which operates the plant in northwest Iowa. Otis says they’re going to create 140 new jobs in the operation to combine with the 210 workers that currently exist in the plant. Otis says the expansion will create three new microwave bacon lines and double the Sioux Center facility’s processing capabilities. He says it’s precooked, ready to eat bacon that’s used in the fast-food industry for chains like Burger King, Arby’s, McDonalds and Subway. Otis says the expansion will also increase their demand for pork.
He says the expansion will use about seven million more pounds of Iowa pork bellies from Iowa hogs. He says most of the pork will come from the Sioux City John Morrel facility and the Sioux Falls John Morrel processing plant. Otis says they new lines should be up and running by January of 2006. He says they’ll start hiring later in the fall. Otis says the production line workers will make 10 dollars an hour with full benefits.
Cudahy is based in Cudahy, Wisconsin and is a subsidiary of Smithfield Foods. Smithfield officials say they have just over 38-hundred employees working in their Iowa plants.
