CALF_News_Oct_Nov_2018

25 CALF News • October | November 2018 • www.calfnews.net Continued on page 27  Corporate Office n Winchester, VA n 540-877-9632 n valleyproteins.com We offer high-energy fats and quality protein meals: n Bleachable Fancy Tallow n Recycled Cooking Oil n Choice White Grease n Meat and Bone Meal n Animal Vegetable Blends n Blood Meal We’ve added locations in the West to bring our services closer to you. Amarillo, TX San Angelo, TX Veribest, TX Durant, OK Oklahoma City, OK Bernalillo, NM was developing an all-natural product. According to Klute, it was a simple pro- gram offering age and source verification for ranch-sourced antibiotic-free and hormone-free cattle. Times changed and, eventually, the supplying rancher had to sign a 180-page guarantee about how his/her cattle had been handled in order to participate in the program. Dale and Joe decided they should start their own program, and Nebraska Star Beef was born. “It was truly trial and error,” Klute says. They started out selling primal cuts but found they couldn’t compete with the big suppliers. They moved into indi- vidually cut steaks and burger patties, as well as beef jerky. In that they found their niche. “We sell over the internet, and the business grows every year,” Klute says. “We are now on Amazon.” They’ve also developed a whole array of seasonings as well as kits for making jerky out of any type of meat. One of their major sale points is their process- ing. According to their website,“We work with a small, local, family-owned butcher shop to harvest and package our beef. We drive the cattle there ourselves. Once harvested we hang the halves to age the beef, the old fashioned way. When the beef has aged properly, their expert butchers cut it into our steaks, package it in heavy cryovac packing and flash freeze.” One of the secrets Joe Klute sees a lot of salesmen in his line of work, so he knows there are “a lot of products that offer a lot of solutions.” Dr. Henry, the company nutritionist, suggested they run a large feedlot test on a product he thought was viable and might be a good addition to their natural beef program. They started using Natur- Safe® from Diamond V in 2014 on the natural cattle and eventually added it to all of their rations. A natural yeast prod- uct that, Klute says, is easy to feed and, according to their fecal samples, reduces RIGHT: Phelps County Feeders headquarters. Photo by Nebraska Star Beef.