Ranchers & producers
Toll harvest and custom processing where you own the animal from gate to box. You keep the brand and the customer; we do the manufacturing — and help you find the market.
Why we are here
Independent beef processing has been disappearing for decades. A handful of companies harvest and sell most of the cattle in this country. When the plants that served everyone else close, a rancher loses the ability to sell anything but a commodity animal — and a community loses the ability to feed itself from the land around it.
The Southwest feels it worse than most. There are a lot of cattle here and very little capacity to harvest them. We are rebuilding that capacity one plant at a time, so ranchers in this region have somewhere to take their cattle, and the schools, food banks, grocers, restaurants and individuals in our communities can buy beef raised down the road instead of trucked in from five states away.
Who we serve
Built for the people who raise, move and sell beef.
Brands & direct marketers
Co-packing and private label on our grant of inspection, with the label, claims and packaging work handled here rather than sent out.
Distribution & retail
Primals and subprimals for butcher counters, portion cuts, and case-ready formats — New Mexico–raised, cut to your spec, an hour from Santa Fe.
Foodservice & institutions
Ground beef in institutional pack, patties and center-of-plate cuts for restaurants, schools, senior meal programs and food banks.
Services
What the plant will run.
Beef, and beef done properly, before anything else. Cold chain and custom work come up first because they don’t wait on the grant of inspection; inspected harvest and value-added follow.
Line 01
Beef harvest & fabrication
Federally inspected harvest, chill, and fabrication to your cut sheet. Toll work where you own the animal from gate to box, custom harvest and cut-and-wrap for freezer beef customers, and fabrication on carcasses or sides you bring in. Humane handling and food safety systems built to a higher standard than the minimum, on purpose.
Line 02
Cutting & portion control
Steaks cut to weight and thickness spec, portion-control center-of-plate cuts, roasts, and chef-ready trim. Consistent portions are what keep a restaurant’s plate cost predictable and a retail case looking right — it is detail work, and it is where a lot of small plants fall down.
Line 03
Grinding, marinades & value-added
Lean grind in bulk and institutional pack, formed patties, fresh sausage, and marinated and seasoned cuts. Green and red chile products are a New Mexico thing and ought to be made in New Mexico.
Line 04
Packaging & private label
Vacuum pack as standard, retail-ready formats, GS1 barcodes, and label development for brands running attributed claims — grass-fed, source-verified, breed and program claims. Label setup handled here rather than sent out.
Line 05
Cold storage, freezing & fulfillment
There is effectively no public refrigerated warehousing between Albuquerque and Pueblo, and we sit on I-25 in the middle of that gap. Frozen and chilled pallet storage, blast freezing as a service, cross-dock for brands running Front Range routes, and pick-pack-ship for ranchers selling beef boxes online.
Co-packing
Co-packing and private label for brands, foodservice and institutional clients.
We will co-pack for customers who have the demand but not the plant. You bring the material or the program; we bring the establishment number, the food safety system, the crew and the pack. You keep the brand, the customer and the margin.
What we run
Co-packing services
- Fabrication from carcasses, primals or subprimals you supply
- Portion cutting to your spec — weight, thickness and trim level
- Grinding to your lean point, in chub, bulk or formed patty
- Fresh sausage, marinated and seasoned items to your formula
- Vacuum pack, rollstock and case-ready formats
- Retail, foodservice and institutional pack sizes
- Blast freezing, cold storage and order fulfillment
- Production under your label on our grant of inspection
Where we help you get it right
Technical assistance
- Product and formula development, bench samples and test runs
- USDA label development and FSIS label approval
- Claims support — grass-fed, source-verified, breed, NAE and ABF, welfare, regenerative
- Nutrition facts panels and ingredient statements
- GS1 and UPC setup, case coding and lot coding
- Packaging specification — film, tray and case selection, and supplier sourcing
- Spec sheets, case dimensions and pallet configuration for your distributor
- HACCP documentation and traceability
- Shelf-life and yield testing
One step further
Private label programs — we can source it too
Co-packing assumes you already own the material. A private label program does not. If you have the brand and the customer but no cattle and no supply chain behind them, we can run the whole thing — source to your specification, process and pack under your label, and stay with you once the product is in the market.
- Sourcing to your spec — breed, program, grade, weight range and claims, from producers we know personally
- Supply planning, so the volume is there every week and not just the week you launch
- Harvest, fabrication and pack to your finished product spec
- Your brand on the label, our establishment number underneath it
- Grading, claims verification and documentation that stands up to an audit
- Cold storage and release against your orders
- Market support — introductions into distribution, retail and foodservice, and help holding the program together after it lands
Most of this is work a small brand cannot justify hiring for and a large plant will not sit down and do with you. Tell us the product you are trying to put on a shelf or a menu and we will tell you what it takes to make it.
Market access
We don’t just process your beef. We help you sell it.
This is a hands-on team of people who have spent their careers across the protein supply chain — ranching and livestock production, procurement, harvest and processing, cold chain and logistics, and wholesale and retail sales. From gate to plate. Most ranchers do not have a problem raising good cattle; they have a problem getting paid for what makes those cattle worth more.
Direct to consumer
Freezer beef, quarters and halves, and online beef box programs. Harvest, cut sheets, labeling, freezer space and pick-pack-ship handled here — so you can sell to your customer without running a shipping operation out of a garage freezer.
Collaborative marketing program
Very few single ranches can fill a retail or foodservice program alone. We aggregate cattle from producers running comparable programs so a group can supply the volume and week-to-week consistency none of them could commit to individually — and each operation keeps its own identity.
Federal, state and local food programs
Public dollars are being spent on locally raised food and the buyers cannot find supply — New Mexico Grown, school districts, senior meal programs, food banks, tribal food distribution and university dining. We handle the institutional pack format, the supplier qualification and the paperwork that keeps most ranches out of that channel.
Attributed, claims-based branded sales
Grass-fed and grass-finished, source-verified, breed, NAE and ABF, regenerative and animal-welfare claims are only worth money if they survive to the label. USDA quality grading, label approval, private label under your brand, and introductions to the retail, distribution and foodservice accounts that actually pay for the claim.
A few producers want all four. Most want one. Tell us which market you are trying to reach and we will tell you honestly what it takes to get there — and whether it is worth it.
Why here
Freight is a real line on the invoice.
Every mile between the animal and the plant, and between the plant and the plate, comes out of somebody’s margin. Driving distance from our dock:
| Market | What’s there | Miles |
|---|---|---|
| Santa Fe | Retail, hotel and restaurant trade, state government | 65 |
| Taos | Independent grocery and butcher counters, resort dining | 75 |
| Cimarron | Philmont Scout Ranch — high-volume seasonal foodservice | 60 |
| Albuquerque | Largest school district in the state, co-op distribution, food banks | 120 |
| Denver / Front Range | Specialty distribution, frozen and value-added product | 390 |
For comparison: product moving into Santa Fe from Denver runs about 390 miles, and from Texas into Albuquerque roughly 450. Same product, six times the freight.
Where things stand
We are committed to opening in early 2027.
The plant is under new ownership and is being brought back online in phases. The building is sound, the equipment is being assessed trade by trade, and the rehabilitation and inspection work is sequenced to have the floor running early next year.
Producers who talk to us now help shape the cut sheets, the schedule and the rate card — and they get first call on harvest dates when we open.
If you’re planning 2027 cattle
Start the conversation this fall. Harvest slots, program specs and label work all take longer than people expect, and the plants that exist today are already booked out.
Partners & supporters
We are not doing this alone.
Bringing a plant back online takes ranching, operating, regulatory and commercial experience at the same time. These are the people working on it with us.
Supply-chain and program development, gate to plate — processing strategy,
producer programs and market development.
pasturedproteins.com
Food safety and regulatory — HACCP, SSOP, humane handling and the federal
grant of inspection.
meatchris.com
Lazy-Lo Ranch, LLC
Cattle production — raises Wagyu cattle in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Contact
Tell us what you need processed, or what you need to buy.
We would rather have a real conversation than send a brochure. What we want to know: what animal or product, roughly what volume, what spec, where it needs to go, and when. That is enough for us to tell you honestly whether we are a fit.
Rate card available on request. Pricing is built per program — toll and custom work, co-packing on outside material, and finished product all price differently, and we would rather quote your situation than post a number that doesn’t apply to it.
General enquiries
- contact@southwestpacking.com
- Plant
- 27 Sale Barn Rd
Las Vegas, NM 87701