Slicing, packaging, automatic loading and more QUALITY FOR THE SMALLER PROCESSOR A trend has developed among consumers across the country and world looking for alternatives to commodity meats. Shoppers today often look for local products and try to support small and local businesses. The farm-to-fork movement and taste for premium meats have fueled farmers, ranchers, and entrepreneurs to enter the processing business on smaller scales to provide the products and create a new market. The market, in turn, has created the need for smaller meat processing operations, including new construction processing plants. In the past few years, family farms and ranchers have begun to use their knowledge of raising animals and understanding of what it takes to produce high quality meat to forge partnerships and move into the processing industry. Some farms ventured into