Each day I get flooded with news about the meat industry in my in-box. Depending on the day, it could be about new products and exciting growth from processors. Other times, it’s all about recalls and health studies that want to limit your daily meat intake to a quarter of a snack stick. I have to process it all, but I’ll admit that I much prefer the good news days.

It was an exciting time to be at this year’s Annual Meat Conference for that reason. The AMC is, year after year, filled with people who are involved with the marketing, manufacturing or selling of meat products. They’re excited by new products and well-versed in the latest trends. They take a realistic outlook at the rise of plant-based meats rather than a panicked position. Overall, I came away with a lot of good news that I hope to share with you over the coming months.

If your business has experienced some good news, we would love to hear from you, as there are two annual special articles coming out later this year that should be of interest to you. The first is The National Provisioner’s Top 100 Report. Each year, we ask leading processors to send us their latest company information for our report via this form here: https://www.provisioneronline.com/top-100-questionnaire.

We’ve had a new chart in the last couple of Top 100 Reports that highlight the fastest-growing companies – not necessarily the biggest. This chart should be particularly interesting to small processors who are experiencing significant growth over the last couple of years. So, even if you’re not a $100 million or even a $30 million company, please fill out the form and tell us about your success.

The second article is the 6^th Annual Independent Processor of the Year Award. Each year, we look for a few companies that we feel best exemplify all the virtues of an idea small/mid-sized meat processor. Of course, financial success plays a part, but so does innovation, community stewardship and employee relations. Once we decide upon our finalists, our team of editors and industry experts review the submission forms and help us choose an Independent Processor of the Year. That processor is then featured on the cover of our August issue.

If you would like to learn more about this award, please email me at gazdziaks@bnpmedia.com. I look forward to learning more about your good news.