The COVID-19 pandemic has brought its own set of challenges to whole-muscle processing. Whole-muscle cuts, many of which are higher in value, have become a challenge for manufacturers to figure out how to distribute those to a growing population of consumers that are in a bit of a crisis mode, says Jeff Sindelar, associate professor and extension meat specialist in the Animal Sciences College of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Additionally, most consumers don’t have the same disposable income as before COVID-19, and ground beef generally has become in greater demand than more expensive whole-muscle cuts, he says.
Consumers also are buying in different patterns than they did before the pandemic, and certain whole-muscle products are seeing an uptick in demand, says Jacob Nelson, facilities manager and meat processing specialist at Oklahoma State University’s Robert M. Kerr Food and Agricultural Products Center in Stillwater. Manufacturers are diverting whole-muscle products that might have otherwise been headed to the foodservice sector and tailoring the products for retail. Across the industry, COVID-19 has added to the challenge of finding enough employees for daily production.