Gentert Packing Co. is a meat processing fixture in the small village of Holstein, Neb., where it not only serves as a custom processor to the locals but also produces upwards of 40 different meat products sold at its modest retail store. An important segment of its business is in the meat snack space and the products have earned the company plenty of accolades.

The husband-and-wife owners of the operation, Belinda and Mark Gentert recently earned the top spot for its Beef Pepper Sticks entry in the meat snack stick category at this year’s American Association of Meat Processors’ American Cured Meat Championships (ACMC). Like many smaller, family-owned processers, Gentert offers customers more than a dozen flavors of sticks. One of the biggest sellers in its retail store is its Jalapeno Cheddar Stick, but this year’s winner was its Pepper Stick. The Genterts also tried something different at this year’s ACMC. For the first time, Gentert Packing entered a stick that was formulated to be shelf stable, which it knew was a gamble. But that bet paid off when the meat stick was recognized as the Grand Champion by the judges.

“We don’t really do a lot of fermenting in our sticks, so we have to keep them refrigerated,” Mark Gentert said. For this year’s entry, however, Gentert used a slightly altered formula that included citric acid in its Pepper Stick, which meant it wouldn’t have to be refrigerated. That subtle change, which was tweaked to ensure the acidity was not too overwhelming, turned out to be the optimum blend. Another option to achieve shelf stability that some processors incorporate utilizes a starter culture in the production process, but Gentert that wasn’t the right option for him.

“It must’ve been the right one because we won, and that was the only change we made this year,” he said.

In his experience, Gentert said a slightly bold acidity and tell-tale flavor of shelf-stable snack sticks are more commonly sold by processors in the northern part of the country, while in many southern states that flavor is much less popular. Being based in the Midwest, Gentert said his Midwestern customers’ preferences are split when it comes to refrigerated versus shelf stable snack sticks.

“With this citric acid we mix it in right at the end and it just gives it a little bit of a tang, but not overbearing and not so much that it changed our flavor profiles much,” he said.

Gentert Packing is no stranger to winning trophies and plaques for its products, including being named the 2024 Grand Champion in the Braunschweiger category and earning the Grand Champion award in the Country Bacon category in the 2023 ACMC (this year that same bacon came in second place/Reserve Grand Champion).

The awards don’t go unnoticed by customers and Gentert does its best to promote the latest award winning products to pique customers’ interest. Gentert said the company’s top selling retail item is its Country Bacon followed closely by its line of snack sticks.

Gentert Packing Co. owners, Belinda and Mark Gentert were successful in the 2024 ACMC, with awards in four categories, including Grand Champion in both Meat Snack Sticks and Braunschweiger.

| Source: Gentert Packing Co./ Brianna Haith

As a very small-size processor, Gentert’s production schedule typically includes about 1,000 lbs of meat sticks per month in addition to approximately 500 lbs of jerky products each month that are made for the company’s relatively small retail store. The jerky products (restructured and whole muscle) are all made from beef. About 80% of the company’s meat sticks sold are beef derived and the remaining 20% are made from pork. The same meat stick flavors and jerky products that are sold at Gentert’s retail store also are available using venison meat from the company’s custom processing orders. For more than 35 years, Gentert has been the go-to processor for generations of deer hunters in the area and in late August, the company’s team was ramping up for the onslaught of custom deer processing that coincides with the opening of deer season in September each year. While it’s not been an item the Genterts have entered into a competition yet, one of the most popular sticks it makes is based on the award-winning Pepper Stick that is blended with ghost pepper cheese, which adds ample heat.

“Ghost pepper is probably one of the hotter cheeses you can put in a product without having to put a warning label on it,” Gentert said, “and we sell a lot of that.”

To make it convenient for regular customers, Gentert’s meat snacks are displayed in a dedicated cooler so shoppers can grab and go quickly with their favorite products. And unlike some companies that sell single sticks, Gentert’s sticks come in packages of four or five.

And despite Gentert’s rural location, the convenience of its meat snacks allows it to compete with foodservice options in Holstein.

“I’m in a pretty small town of less than 180 people,” Gentert said, and there is one nearby bar and grill where locals can dine, but often, running into the local meat shop is preferred.

“Nine times out of 10, if they’re in a hurry and they have things to do, (customers) just roll in here and grab a pack of sticks or a couple packs of sticks and a can of pop and that’s their lunch,” he said. “And that’s pretty cheap compared to going to the bar and grabbing a couple of cheeseburgers and french fries.”

Cornhusker quality

Tim Blattner, manager at Amana Meat Shop & Smokehouse in Amana, Iowa, for the past six-and-a-half years, said he was a little surprised when he got the news that the company’s cheddar-jalapeno flavored meat snack stick won gold (Grand Champion) at this year’s ACMC. He and his production supervisor, who delivered and entered Amana’s products in this year’s competition in Omaha, assumed the flavored snack sticks wouldn’t fare very well in the competition because the casings on the products were not exactly wrinkle-free, but the judges obviously felt otherwise.

The judges also gave Amana’s whole muscle jerky entry high marks, recognizing it with the Reserve Grand Champion award, giving the company the first two championships in the past six years of competing.

When he assumed the manager role, Blattner said the company began competing in the ACMC for fun and focused mostly on entering its whole muscle jerky products and occasionally some other products, like its bratwurst, gleaning what it could from how those products scored and trying to learn from comments left by the judges on their scoring card. He said 2024 was the third time Amana entered both categories of snack sticks (Meat Snack Sticks and Meat Snack Sticks – flavored).

Source: Amana Meat Shop & Smokehouse

One important lesson Blattner and his Amana Meat Shop & Smokehouse team learned from the competitions is not to reinvent products that don’t score particularly well based solely on a few judges’ opinions.

“If something doesn’t win, they (ACMC organizers) always remind everybody that, ‘Hey, if your product’s selling well where you’re at, don’t change anything based only on a few judges not scoring it the way you thought it should have been,’” Blattner said.

Like most competitors, Amana’s entries each year are reflections of products it regularly produces and sells to customers at retail. Besides, since the competition comes at a time of year when many plants, including Amana, are gearing up for the very busy holiday season, experimenting with new formulas and products just for a competition doesn’t make sense when smokehouse time is at a premium, plus the fact that the company only operates with two smokehouses.

“We elected to just keep doing our product as we always do and see if we can make it better with some of their feedback each year, and it finally happened for us this year,” Blattner said.

Selling the products to retail outlets, to wholesale customers and through its website, Amana is seeing an uptick in demand for the award-winning products, which it is touting through local promotions and online campaigns that feature the products. Amana’s meat snack production keeps its smokehouses full about 50% of the time, according to Blattner, and those products account for about 25% to 30% of the sales at the Iowa plant.

All for one

Most AAMP members laud the relationships and support they get from other processors in the association. Blattner said that has been true in his experiences in competing in the ACMC as well.

“The funny thing is, whenever I go there, yes, you’re in a competition, but you never really feel like it because everyone’s friendly and willing to give advice or recommendations,” he said. “I think a lot of that is because we’re all kind of scattered all over the country, so you don’t necessarily see someone else as a competitor, but rather just maybe on the same meat processing team to make sure we’re all giving out quality products. So, it’s a great community to be a part of.”