Bell & Evans’ Organic Chicken Harvesting Facility, Fredericksburg, Pennsylvania

Bell & Evans’ new chicken harvesting facility is being built on an area of 411,500ft². Credit: Bell & Evans.

The organic-certified chicken harvesting facility will be operational by late 2021. Credit: Bell & Evans.

The company’s first humane, animal-welfare-focused organic chicken hatchery was opened in June 2017. Credit: Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Bell & Evans is building a new organic-certified chicken harvesting facility in Fredericksburg, Pennsylvania, to double its production capacity to meet rising customer demands in the US.

The construction of the facility started with the placement of the first precast walls in July 2020. The facility will start commercial operations in December 2021.

The harvesting facility will involve an investment of approximately $330m, of which $300m is funded by Rabobank through a senior secured credit facility closed in September 2020. It is the first Green Loan in the US poultry sector as the facility is strictly based on the Green Loan Principles.

Bell & Evans plans to build another new harvesting facility of similar capacity to triple the current production in the next ten years.

Bell & Evans’ organic chicken harvesting facility location

Bell & Evans’ new 411,500ft² chicken harvesting facility is being constructed within the company’s 112-acre greenfield Chicken Harvesting Campus located in a small town of Fredericksburg in Pennsylvania.

The second harvesting facility of the company will also be developed on the same campus. All the company’s operations exist within a three-mile radius of Fredericksburg.

Bell & Evans’ organic chicken harvesting facility details

The new facility is being constructed with European-Plus design durable and high-quality materials for longevity and increased food safety and sanitation.

The operations area will be developed with Thermomass precast concrete exterior walls for superior thermal rating. The interior sides of the walls will be made of white concrete to offer a brighter environment in the areas.

The acid-proof brick flooring of production floors will prevent corrosion while the freezer floors will be insulated with 6in-thick extruded polystyrene for frost heave prevention.

Wood will not be used in the production areas and processing areas will not have any painted surfaces.

Extra hatchers were added to the company’ chicken hatchery to increase capacity and support growth. The facility will utilise an upgraded Slow Induction Anaesthesia system while the existing superior live receiving area will also be upgraded.

A new automated transport system will eliminate the use of fork trucks for offloading drawers of chickens from transportation into harvesting. The facility is being developed with innovative 3D design, including modified set up of equipment for improved collaboration among the managers, vendors and installers in real-time.

Sustainability features implemented by the company

The new facility will be equipped with a fully computerised utility system to run the entire facility, ensuring water and energy efficiency and reuse. Most of the production spaces will include windows for natural light.

 The facility will feature state-of-the-art processing equipment and an upgraded 100% air chill system to reduce water usage. The sanitisation systems will use hot water generated by waste heat at the organic rendering plant. This will reduce daily carbon emissions, as well as boiler system usage.

The water from the onsite wastewater treatment plant will be recycled to wash the components of live haul transportation.

Contractors involved

Stellar, a design-build company based in the US, was contracted to design the new facility. It was also involved in the development of Bell & Evans’ packaging, storage and frozen processing facility, as well as a chicken hatchery.

Food processing systems and equipment supplier Marel will provide the processing equipment for the project.

Bell & Evans’ product portfolio

The products offered by the company include fresh chicken, prepared chicken, organic chicken, gluten-free chicken and other poultry.

The fresh chicken segment contains boneless, skinless chicken breasts, split breasts, boneless, skinless chicken tenders, organic boneless, skinless chicken tenders, chicken thighs, whole legs, drumsticks, cut wings and organic cut wings.

The products in the prepared chicken segment include chicken bacon and Sharp Cedar Gourmet Chicken Burgers, Roasted Portabella and Swiss Gourmet Chicken Burgers and Granny Smith Apple & Gouda Gourmet Chicken Burgers.

The company introduced chicken nuggets and tenders in 1999 while the gluten-free nuggets and gluten-free tenders were launched in 2005. The company launched its organic products line in 2009.

Marketing commentary on Bell & Evans

Bells & Evans, a premium poultry producer, is the oldest branded chicken company in the US. It has been in business for 125 years and producing organic products for a decade. The company is a pioneer of natural chicken raised without antibiotics and has set the highest animal welfare standards in the industry.

Bells & Evans produces 100% premium raised-without-antibiotics chicken and organic chicken, which contributes approximately 60% and 40% to the company’s business respectively.

The company was praised by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and Temple Grandin for the introduction of Slow Induction Anaesthesia in 2011.

The products offered by Bell &Evans are sold at premium health-food markets and upscale retailers such as Wegmans Food Markets, Whole Food Market, Roche Bros, Supermarkets, Publix and Lunds & Byerlys.

In July 2017, the company opened the world’s first organic certified, animal-welfare-focused chicken hatchery that received its first hatch of the new breed, Das Klassenbester^™, higher-welfare chickens, in November 2017.