Retirement would not stick for MeatCrafters owners, husband and wife, Mitch Berliner and Debra Moser.

So what did the two entrepreneurial minds decide to do? Start a Charcuterie and sausage business in a USDA-inspected processing plant.

In recent years, MeatCrafters found its footing and used every bit of its 8000-square-foot plant, in Landover, Md., to provide an assortment of charcuterie products, salamis, sausage and bacon for customers around the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia (DMV).

Moser did not have any background in the meat industry beforehand. However, she built businesses and brands throughout her career as a successful marketer, teacher and businesswoman.

“I always think that our past brings us to the point we’re at now,” Moser said. “So the skills that we learned in business brought us to this point.”

Following a large learning curve, Moser now understands how she can help the meat company be successful.

“It was a huge learning curve, and, honestly, I could not go in there, into the production room and make the salami myself,” Moser said. “I’ve tried, and they laugh at me because I’m very slow at it. But all of the expertise that everybody brings to this and their different backgrounds and expertise has really made this vision come to fruition.”

Moser credits her husband’s background and retired business partner Stan Feder, who provided food knowledge on high-quality sausage products.

Before MeatCrafters, Berliner worked in several food industry sectors, including natural and premium ice creams and frozen products in the mid-Atlantic.

In his career, he operated Berliner Foods before selling it to Edy’s Ice Creams, and later he was the Mid-Atlantic distributor for Unilever.

 After selling his second business Berliner tried to retire, but he decided that he wanted to make salamis instead. That retirement attempt has now turned into a new profession.

The company started as Simply Sausage in 2005 and eventually transformed into MeatCrafters in 2015.

Following his time working as a research political scientist at the Central Intelligence Agency, Feder dedicated his skills to sausage making by working on apprenticeships in Europe while starting his company Simply Sausage.

“Every little bit of knowledge that we brought to this helped move this business along in a unique way,” Moser said.

Jumping into Meat

Moser became more involved with the business in January 2020 by building out the website for online orders and working to grow brand recognition.

Having the website ready just as the COVID-19 pandemic struck kept the business in a favorable position.

With processing capacity showing volatility during the first year of the pandemic, MeatCrafters continued to grow. The company brought on a salesman in 2021. Before that, the original partners were in charge of sales and of building brand awareness.

With retirement as an option, Berliner and Moser could have quit this venture when the pandemic hit, but they weren’t interested in laying people off.

“I said there’s got to be some way we can save this and not close up and save everybody’s job,” Moser said.

After enduring those early months, MeatCrafters remained ready to take on all challenges ahead. The company grew exponentially year-over-year and now stands at 17 people with its own production and shipping department.

Before adding new employees, Moser handled the accounting, while the staff concentrated on making sausages, charcuterie and packing boxes.

Now the meat processor has expanded the business’s packaging, warehouse and production. It’s been upgraded to have all the packaging equipment, dry ice machines and necessary software to track orders.

“I had to start putting in the layers of managers and assistant production managers and people who had specific oversight over things,” Moser said.

Moser also recently added a chief operations officer to ensure the company continues to grow on the correct trajectory.

Source: MeatCrafters

 

Building out products

As a smaller operation, MeatCrafters serves its existing clients but takes chances by creating new products. In 2021, it introduced a new line of sliced charcuteries for retail stores and added food service products to its product line.

An example of that a best seller is its duck prosciutto that’s seasoned with sea salt, black pepper, thyme, garlic bay leaves and juniper.

The company also continues to build out its MeatCrafters line of bacon, which was recently featured in a supplement of the MEAT+POULTRY magazine.

Another important piece to MeatCrafters success is chef Alex Mejia. The chief sausage maker has worked as a chef in the DC area since 1998 and has worked in the kitchen with world-renowned chef José Andrés.

Having the expertise of Mejia helps MeatCrafters stand out to its buyers who want specialized creations. Under Mejia’s direction the company now produces flavor profiles from 16 different countries.

“We grind all of our own spice mixes fresh each morning,” Moser said. “We don’t buy spice mixes.”

Operating a processing facility close to a global city like Washington, DC, allows the company to cater to the needs of restaurants and caterers that serve dishes inspired by cultures worldwide.

Moser shared the importance of providing custom processing for restaurants in the area to create unique specialty items.

“We’re always coming up with new recipes, usually for a client who really needs something special developed for them,” she said.

Through well-placed resources in online advertising and finding the correct way to distribute its product, including on Amazon, MeatCrafters continues to grow its reputation as a high-quality product line.

MeatCrafters has diversified its business by moving into grocery stores, wine and cheese shops, breweries, wineries and other retailers, as well as working on custom orders for restaurants in the area.

Small space, big results

With all this business growth, it’s impressive that all the processing happens in an 8,000-square-foot plant.

After first building customized spaces, MeatCrafters recently finished a new curing room that will allow it to triple its business and its ability for meat production.   

The company takes care of each bit of processing in the blooming and curing rooms, using computers to measure and watch pH levels and water consistency, so they know precisely when the products are ready for packaging.

When Moser takes people through plant tours, she always looks for reactions.

“It’s always fascinating to watch their faces because a lot of people think that the products are cooked, but it’s not. It’s cured, which is why the HACCP plan is so important,” Moser said. “The USDA doesn’t give out these licensees lightly. They want to make sure everything’s being done properly and documented properly.”

Along with the curing rooms, MeatCrafters built out processing rooms, freezer space, office space, smokers and storage, which helped the growing demand for their services.

“That’s the last bit of space we have right now, and we’ll utilize that till we have to make the next big decision,” Moser said.

Currently, MeatCrafters runs five days a week on-site from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m., with a USDA inspector on site. The company only runs one shift, but a second shift will probably become necessary within the next year.

With the curing process for many items taking 6 to 8 weeks, the meat producer must keep up its schedule as it works with new and existing customers.  

“We’re constantly rotating through the production, so we know what days we’re making sausages, what days we’re going to make whole muscle products, what days we’re going to make salamis,” Moser said.

To keep track of the orders, the company invested in a new inventory system to keep all of its recipes and supplies up-to-date and integrated.

Another unique part of MeatCrafters is being a USDA-inspected facility only 11 miles from downtown Washington, DC, giving it a chance to help restaurants, customers and farmers inside and outside of the DC area.  

However, with the demand, MeatCrafters understands that distribution and delivery must be done by more than just them. According to Moser, MeatCrafters now works with distributors to send its meat to 17 states.

Much of the distribution in the DMV area is still run by local distributors, but MeatCrafters knew the attention to the products was the key part of their success.

“We just didn’t have the staff to handle both the production and delivery,” she said.

Through this fantastic ride, Moser and MeatCrafters remain dedicated to crafting high-quality products. Building a small business that creates an interesting workplace and employee experience has also been rewarding.

“It’s a great thing to see a company grow and know that you’ve brought all these people along as well. That’s really, really important to us that everybody is happy, and everybody has a say in the company processes and product line.”

In this next entrepreneurial phase, she’s seen excitement from all levels of the business, which continues to be the winning combination for the company.

“I think about building a business where people want to be creating a great product and then putting those two things together to see where we can take it,” Moser said.