Demand For Chicken On The Rise, Official Says

The work may be tough but the end-product is anything but that, an official with one of the nation’s fastest growing chicken processing companies said Tuesday.

David Hundley, general manager for grain merchandising with Ozark Mountain Poultry, spoke to the Jonesboro Regional Chamber of Commerce Agri-Business committee about the work of his company.

The company has a grain elevator in nearby Bay, as well as a feed mill and hatchery in the Batesville area.

Recently, Ozark Mountain Poultry broke ground on a feed mill in nearby Magness and it has processing plants in Warren and Rogers, Hundley said.

The chickens are sold under the Forester’s Farmer’s Market label at Wal Mart, Sam’s Club and other grocery stores in Arkansas, Oklahoma and Missouri as well as to restaurants like Hooters and Panera Bread, Hundley said.

“We sell the wings to Hooters,” Hundley told the group.

Employees work to debone by hand at least three million pounds of chicken meat per week and buy several million bushel of corn during the same time to fatten up the birds, Hundley said.

The demand for chicken has been up locally, in part due to the announcement earlier this year by Peco Foods to build a facility in Pocahontas as well as a feed mill in Corning, Hundley said.

Hundley said his company is trying to produce a non-genetically modified chicken.

“That is where the demand is. The Whole Foods (store chain) works to sell organically grown chickens,” Hundley said.

The company started with about 50 employees in 2000, but now has around 1,100 employees, Hundley said.

Hundley also credited company owner Ed Fryar with the company’s success.

Fryar is scheduled to speak at the chamber’s Agri-Business Breakfast in January. Committee chairman Cary C. Matthews said officials are still attempting to set the date for the event, but are definitely looking forward to hearing from Fryar.