Costco Connection - July 2010

Farms supply eggs to Foster Farms’ seven hatcheries, where they are kept in an incubator for 21 days. In California, when the newborn chicks hatch, they are taken to one of the company-owned ranches, many of which are within 35 miles of the Livingston plant. In the Paci;c Northwest, chickens are raised on company-owned ranches as well as those owned by local families, and processed at a Foster Farms facility located in Kelso, Washington. Each chicken spends about 45 days on the ranch. During that time, the chickens have constant access to the company’s own corn and soybean meal feed.

At Taylor Ranch, a;er sheathing my feet in plastic, donning a safety suit and putting on rubber boots (this is not for my welfare, by the way—it’s all about bio-security and keeping the chickens healthy), I am allowed into one of the 20 chicken houses on-site.

;ere are 20,000 chickens in this one house. ;e building is so big I cannot see the other end. I expect to be overwhelmed by smell. I am not. I expect to see bedraggled birds. I do not. ;e air temperature is pleasant and there is plenty of light (both are maintained by a high-tech computerized monitoring system). ;e chickens are milling about, clean, clucking and alert.

“;ey are pampered,” says Tim Hoover, who grew up on Taylor Ranch when his father ran it. “Good chicken is good business,” adds Danny Cupit, Tim’s supervisor, whose family has worked with Foster Farms for three generations.

Debeaking, a cruel practice at some farms, does
not take place here. “Debeaking takes place because
the chickens are ;ghting each other,” says Cupit.
“;ey ;ght each other because they are in miserable
conditions. Here, we make the conditions perfect.
;ese birds are happy.”
Even at the processing plant, the emphasis is on
being humane: Foster Farms has developed a pro-
cess that keeps the birds calm and serene right up to
the end.

“We control all aspects of the process,” says Foster. “It is the best way to ensure that things are done right.”

24 ;e Costco Connection JULY 2010

Employees, ecology, environment, etc.

Speaking of the processing plant, the employees don’t need anything like debeaking either. I’ve worked in assembly-line jobs. I remember what it was like, and it wasn’t like this. Walking the lines at the Livingston plant, I see intent, smiling, interactive people.

“;e employee turnover here is 10 percent,” says
Richie King, who oversees all plant operations. “It’s
the lowest in the industry.”
In this Rube Goldberg–like maze of machinery
and conveyor belts, King points out where they have
addressed “pinch points,” places where employees’
safety was an issue.

“We call it ‘Fosterizing,’ ” King says of the ways the company has developed new safety equipment and methods. “We have done so well with our safety records that we are running out of room for awards,” he laughs, adding that more than a year has gone by without an injury at the plant.

Foster Farms employs about 12,000 people, many of whom have been with the company for more than 30 years. Families have worked with the company over multiple generations. ;e company’s pay is standard, but the bene;ts are anything but. An active educational partner, the company provides local university scholarships as well as national scholarship opportunities to employees’ children.

supplier profile

Name: Ron Foster

Company: Foster Farms

Employees: 12,000

Address:

1000 Davis St.

“A lot of employees have been able to send their kids to Harvard and Yale,” says King.

Livingston, CA 95334

Phone: (209) 394-7901

While Foster Farms prides itself on the ways it runs its business, the company is just as concerned that others, including competitors, are doing it right as well.

Web site:

www.fosterfarms.com

Items at Costco:

“If one company does something wrong, it has an impact on all of us in the industry,” says Foster. “Whether we’re talking about the environment, food safety, employee safety or practices such as untruthful labeling, we’re just as concerned as the consumer that everyone in the industry is operating their business the right way.”

Nationally: Fresh chicken breast strips, chicken bakes, meatball bakes, sliced turkey, whole turkey. Regionally ( varies): Fresh chicken, rotisserie chicken, wings, corn dogs.

Comments about Costco:

;e irony, he says, is “if you do things right, it’s very e;cient.”

“The relationship between

Food for thought

I le; Foster Farms with a lot to think about. Nothing I found is going to mollify some people. A vegetarian, or someone who thinks all food should come from the backyard, will disapprove.

Costco and Foster Farms goes back more than 20 years. Costco exemplifies the best attributes we would want to see in any partner.

We share the same concerns
about quality, honesty, integ-
rity and value.”—Ron Foster

But the fact is, most people don’t have the space or the time to raise their own food. If you think about how much chicken Americans eat (members purchased close to 200 million pounds from Costco just in the past 12 months), it dawns on you how much chicken needs to be produced to meet demand.

A;er visiting the operations, meeting with the
people responsible for making all this work and see-
ing how much pride they take in what they do, I
“We started out as a small
family farm and grew because
we were giving consumers
what they want-
ed. We remain
a family farm
at heart and in
practice,” says Foster.

“As the company has grown, a lot has changed and very little has changed. We grow and process more birds, but still hatch and raise them with the same care that my grandparents and those that worked with them used over 70 years ago.

Ron Foster once again rebuffs the Foster Imposters, stars of the company’s clever TV commercials, in their attempt to qualify as Foster Farms chickens.