Feb. 22, 2023

Wholestone Farms has formed a new joint venture with Iowa-based Prestage Foods.

The new entity, Prestage Wholestone, will unite the two farmer-owned companies with two pork processing plants: Wholestone’s plant in Fremont, Nebraska, and a Prestage plant that opened in 2019 in north-central Iowa in Eagle Grove.

In a statement, the two said their joint venture “will enhance customer offerings while streamlining pork sales and partnering in hog processing operations.”

Prestage Wholestone will operate from two plant locations with a daily single-shift harvest capacity of approximately 21,000 head per day.

“We are excited and honored to partner with the Prestage family. This is an extremely important next step for the 200-plus farm families that own Wholestone Farms,” Wholestone chairman Luke Minion said in a statement.

“We look forward to demonstrating the benefits of this partnership to our customers, consumers and our owners.”

As for what the move might mean for the planned $600 million pork processing plant in northeast Sioux Falls, which voters allowed to move forward late last year, Minion said in a follow-up statement:

“The Prestage Wholestone joint venture is the right business decision for our farmers right now. We love the Sioux Falls community and our property there. We continue to develop our business options for the Sioux Falls site and communicate specific information when available.”

After the project was delayed from starting construction by the ballot issue, Minion said in early November that currency-related shifts in the export market combined with the inflation of labor, construction and borrowing costs made it a different picture to navigate.

“It’s a very complicated time in the world, and we have to be successful in a project this size,” he said at the time.

The joint Prestage Wholestone venture will start operations no later than Jan. 1, 2024. Third-generation family business Prestage was founded in 1983 by Bill and Marsha Prestage and has turkey and hog processing operations in Iowa, North Carolina and South Carolina.

“The Prestage family is excited to partner with Wholestone Farms, a company comprised of like-minded American farmers and producers that reflect our collective core values from farm to market,” said Ron Prestage, Prestage family representative.