{"id":15387,"date":"2026-01-21T10:27:43","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T17:27:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/?p=15387"},"modified":"2026-01-21T10:27:43","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T17:27:43","slug":"beef-from-new-rancher-owned-packing-plant-in-nebraska-hits-walmart-shelves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/2026\/01\/21\/beef-from-new-rancher-owned-packing-plant-in-nebraska-hits-walmart-shelves\/","title":{"rendered":"Beef From New Rancher-Owned Packing Plant In Nebraska Hits Walmart Shelves"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Nice to see the ranchers fighting back against the foreign owned big meat packing plant, and kudos to Walmart for buying their beef and supporting local ranchers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/cowboystatedaily.com\/2026\/01\/20\/wyoming-mans-sustainable-beef-hits-walmart-shelves\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n
Trey Wasserburger, a cofounder of a new rancher-owned packing plant in western Nebraska, is celebrating as the company’s prime steaks hit Walmart shelves \u2014 sourced partly from Wyoming cattle. \u201cWe hope to be in all Walmart stores fairly soon,\u201d he said.<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

By Ren\u00e9e Jean<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Trey
Trey Wasserburger, a cofounder of a new rancher-owned packing plant in western Nebraska, is celebrating as the company’s prime steaks hit Walmart shelves \u2014 sourced partly from Wyoming cattle. \u201cWe hope to be in all Walmart stores fairly soon,\u201d he said. (Jimmy Orr, Cowboy State Daily)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The first thing Wyoming born and raised rancher Trey Wasserburger did when he heard that steaks from Sustainable Beef\u2019s rancher-owned packing plant in Nebraska had hit store shelves was to go shopping for some of his own beef. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was there this morning,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I bought New York strips, T-bones, and some ribeye tomahawks. So, it\u2019s awesome. It\u2019s fantastic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wasserburger is a cofounder of Sustainable Beef, but he\u2019s also a 2006 graduate of Campbell County High School and has family ties to the Bootheel 7 Ranch in Lusk, which celebrated 100 years of history in 2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He and his wife Dayna, who is a Nebraska native, bought a ranch near North Platte, Nebraska in 2017, where they now operate the TD Angus Ranch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ranch is known for the quality of its genetics and sells bulls across America \u2014 including a rather famous Angus bull named Doc Ryan, which sold for $525,000<\/u><\/a> in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wasserburger said he believes some of the prime and choice cuts from Sustainable Beef should be showing up as of Monday in Wyoming Walmart stores as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sustainable Beef sources a substantial portion of its beef from Wyoming cattle herds, which means some of that meat on Wyoming store shelves likely came from cattle herds in places like Torrington.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe hope to be in all of (Walmart stores) fairly soon,\u201d Wasserburger said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That will just be a process of continuing to scale up their operation, which is focused on processing prime and choice cuts of beef for high-end dinner table menus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Code
Code m3199 marks packages from Sustainable Beef that have landed in Walmart stores. (Courtesy Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Price Makers<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s been a long and winding road from farm to table for American beef. Straightening up that path is part of the concept behind Sustainable Beef, in hopes it will help family ranchers hang onto more of the retail dollar from their beef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Otherwise, their fear is that family ranches will become economically unfeasible and die out in America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ranchers have long faced challenging economics in the commodity markets, where they are the price takers, rather than the price makers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That leaves them navigating things like drought and high production costs amid market volatility that sometimes means they\u2019re not breaking even. Added to that difficulty are regulatory hurdles and labor shortages. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The challenges have pushed many ranchers into an early retirement, even as youths, meanwhile, are becoming less and less interested in trying to replace them, given high risk and ever higher entry costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sustainable Beef just opened in May and is owned by a group of eight ranchers, including Wasserburger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe got together with some like-minded people, the Lapaseotes family, Bob Maxwell and some other cattle feeders who just believed in the same mission and goal to own their own destiny,\u201d Wasserburger said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt takes about five years to complete the cycle, raise the calf all the way through to the food supply chain. And to just throw away the profit in the last 24 hours makes zero sense,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pandemic Forced Their Hand<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The ranch Wasserburger and his wife bought was the Rishel Ranch in the Sandhills of Nebraska. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bill Rishel, the previous owner, had long been at the forefront of innovation in the cattle industry, and was among the first cattlemen to use carcass data and ultrasonography for breeding decisions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Wasserburgers planned to continue Rishel\u2019s vision with the herd he had developed over several decades. But just three years into owning the ranch, the COVID-19 pandemic hit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Things quickly became a little Western for the couple. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe were getting shut out,\u201d Wasserburger recalled. \u201cWe were having trouble getting our cattle in the store.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was a dire situation for the couple, who had mortgage payments to meet and bills coming due.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was definitely in over my head financially,\u201d Wasserburger said. \u201cI had to make a decision, a tough one, to continue down the road of being a price taker or become a price maker.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grocery stores, meanwhile, were facing their own difficulties getting beef on empty store shelves. Ultimately, it was the broken supply chain that helped Wasserburger and his partners make their dream of owning their own packing plant a reality. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWalmart needed a way to get that beef, and we needed a way to get our premium cattle for a great price,\u201d Wasserburger said. \u201cSo, we just met in the middle. we had the same goal, and it\u2019s just been a great marriage. It\u2019s been a great relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
A tomahawk steak that originated from Sustainable Beef’s rancher owned meat processing plant in Nebraska. (Courtesy Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Changing North Platte\u2019s Future<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Sustainable Beef is among the first new packing plants to be built in America in a generation. It\u2019s not a new idea. It\u2019s been tried before, but the time has come for this model, Wasserburger believes, to help family farms and ranches become more sustainable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the meantime, the Sustainable Beef experiment has already boosted economics for North Platte, Nebraska, which made headlines in 2021 as the state\u2019s fastest shrinking town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Early economic indicators have put smiles on a lot of faces in the small town, among them North Platte Area Chamber & Development Corporation President and CEO Gary Person. He weighs in about the changes he\u2019s seen in a documentary put out by First National Bank of Omaha, which is the company\u2019s banker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have broken records in retail sales,\u201d Person said in the documentary. \u201cWe grew valuation substantially. We will have crossed a threshold of $1 billion worth of retail sales and expenditures. That is exactly double what it was five years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New restaurants and small businesses have opened. The community\u2019s hospital underwent a major expansion and its recreation center upgraded as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re at $1.2 billion impact for our community,\u201d Wasserburger said. \u201cWe had to figure out what we do best. And instead of hauling things in, trying to manufacture it and hauling it back out, which doesn\u2019t work. We\u2019ve got to assemble, or in our case disassemble. What we make in this community is cattle and corn.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Nebraska
Nebraska ranchers built a producer-owned beef plant that\u2019s reviving North Platte\u2019s shrinking economy. Wyoming ranchers like the idea but say it\u2019s challenging to copy in the Cowboy State. (Sustainable Beef)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Wyoming Plant Not Out Of Question<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Initially, Wasserburger did try to build his rancher-owned meat packing plant in Wyoming, and was working with Sen. Ogden Driskill, R-Devils Tower, on that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately though, Driskill told Cowboy State Daily in an interview last year that there just weren\u2019t enough of the right elements to create the total package in the Cowboy State for such a large packing plant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen you start getting into these 1,000-plus cattle head a day plants, it\u2019s really complicated,\u201d Driskill said. \u201cI kind of looked around Torrington, and they didn\u2019t have the labor market.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cheyenne had a great location for a packing plant, with an opportunity zone and easy railway access. But North Platte just had a lot more of the necessary feedlot infrastructure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Driskill said if he were to try again, he\u2019d probably look at smaller operations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe truth is, Wyoming would probably be just as far ahead, rather than to have a plant like the one they have (in Nebraska) to have three or four plants that did 500 head a day,\u201d Driskill said. \u201cThen you could scatter them around the state.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The diesel alone from shipping processed beef to markets would be a huge economic boost for any small rural town in Wyoming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wasserburger, meanwhile, said he\u2019s not opposed to building more rancher-owned packing plants, if the experiment he\u2019s started in Nebraska works out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019d love to build more,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we\u2019ve got to get this one going first.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contact Renee Jean at renee@cowboystatedaily.com<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Trey
Trey Wasserburger with his wife Dayna and their children. (Courtesy Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nice to see the ranchers fighting back against the foreign owned big meat packing plant, and kudos to Walmart for buying their beef and supporting local ranchers. https:\/\/cowboystatedaily.com\/2026\/01\/20\/wyoming-mans-sustainable-beef-hits-walmart-shelves\/ Trey Wasserburger, a cofounder of a new rancher-owned packing plant in western Nebraska, is celebrating as the company’s prime steaks hit Walmart shelves \u2014 sourced partly from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health","category-wyoming"],"blocksy_meta":[],"featured_image_src":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Jason","author_link":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/author\/jturning\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15387"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15387\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15388,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15387\/revisions\/15388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}