The meat processing manufacturer Western Smokehouse Partners is looking to fill jobs for its new facility in Mexico, Missouri. Area workforce leaders are hoping it will lead to fewer residents commuting out of town for work.
The company plans to process and package the Chomps beef snack sticks at the planned Mexico plant.
Crystal Bohm, Western Smokehouse Partners chief human resources officer, said the company is looking to hire 70 to 80 people this summer and eventually grow the staff to 225 to 250.
“We will have everything from entry level production all the way up to plant management, FSQA — like food safety quality assurance — warehouse maintenance,” Bohm said. “A lot of the people we will be training from the ground up.”
Bohm said the majority of new employee training will happen in-house, since the processing equipment is so specialized.
“Not a lot of people have worked in a meat plant before, so it is a lot of training,” she said. “Those first couple weeks we're just going to teach you how to make a meat snack.”
Morgan Swing, Western Smokehouse Partners senior manager of recruitment and retention, said most of the jobs the company will offer in Mexico are in the processing and packaging departments.
Fresh or frozen meat will arrive at the plant where it will then be ground, seasoned, put into casings, smoked, cut to size and packaged.
The company plans to start with one shift Monday through Friday, eventually building to two. Pay is expected to be between $18 to $22 per hour.
The job positions for plant manager and maintenance supervisor are posted. The company is retrofitting an existing Mexico facility from its former use as an apparel distribution center.
With the influx of potentially 250 additional jobs, the Mexico Area Chamber of Commerce is trying to convince community members to ditch their commute.
It recently launched work-where-you-live campaign called “It Costs to Commute” that emphasizes the cost and inconvenience of driving out of town for employment.
“We don't have an abundance of available housing right now … so it's going to be difficult to move 250 people in,” said Mexico Area Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Dana Keller. “We need to get people that live here and that are leaving to come back home to work.”
Keller said overall the area’s unemployment level is low and current employers are also looking for workers.
“Most of the people that are able or willing to work are employed,” she said.
Keller said the community is excited about Western Smokehouse Partners opening a plant in Mexico and hopes residents who leave town for work will reconsider.
“It's a chunk of your life when you're on the road, not to mention the cost of it,” she said. “Higher insurance, more in gas … maintenance on your vehicle. It just goes on and on and on.”
When expanding, Bohm said the business was looking for “a good workforce that understands manufacturing” and found that in Mexico.
In addition to the Mexico facility, Western Smokehouse Partners is opening an additional plant in Galesburg, Illinois, where the company is headquartered.
Bohm said the manufacturer has just shy of 1,000 workers right now and the two new plants will bring that number to 1,400 — a far cry from the 250 employees it had in 2020.
Western Smokehouse Partners primarily makes beef sticks, including Chomps, and also some jerky. Swing said the market for those products is doing well.
“There is a turn to make things healthier and that's what we do,” she said, emphasizing the self-stable, grab-and-go qualities of the snack.
“People are really starting to gravitate toward that, and it's been great for us,” she added.
