A company that makes beef products plans an ambitious expansion in the Sioux City area. Beef Products Incorporated, a highly-automated operation that turns slaughterhouse scraps and beef trimmings into a lowfat ingredient for hamburgers, beef hot dogs and other products, will expand with a new plant in South Sioux City, Nebraska.
B-P-I announced Tuesday it’ll spend 400-Million dollars on the four-year expansion just a few miles from its corporate headquarters in Dakota Dunes, South Dakota. Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman praised the ambitious plan, which is expected to create 300 new jobs when it’s done. He hails the continued expansion saying “the last three years and the next three years” add up to a total investment of 750-Million dollars.
At the announcement, owner Eldon Roth said the new plant would mean 300 new jobs in the region. B-P-I — not to be confused with I-B-P — not only processes meat into a lowfat beef product, it uses specialized equipment. When engineers couldn’t find machines they needed, they started to make them, and established a separate division to build and maintain processing machines.
For several years now B-P-I’s been selling and leasing machines to other meat processors. In addition to the South Sioux City plant, B-P-I operates plants in Waterloo, Iowa, in Kansas and in Texas.