Meat&Poultry - February 2011 - 26

PROCESSING I.Q.

the package claiming the sausage is 40 percent leaner than USDA standards. Next, it occurred to him the company’s practice of never adding preservatives to its sausage could also be a selling point, and another starburst was added to packages touting that point.

Smarter future
The second-generation owner of Uncle Charley’s is challenged on many fronts by issues his founding father couldn’t have fathomed in the late 80s. For example, in the name of going green, the company has added a propane-fueled delivery truck to its fleet, which generates its own electricity and powers the refrigerated cargo area. “It runs a lot simpler and much quieter than a big diesel motor and I’m not emitting any fumes or pollution into the atmosphere,” Armitage says, pointing out his willingness to invest in new ideas and the necessity of upgrading the plant’s equipment. This was the philosophy behind the purchase of a new labeling machine (from Ravenwood Packaging) he discovered at the 2009 AMI Innovation Showcase. The machine uses labels that reel on top of each other and don’t require adhesive backing paper, “so I don’t have any of that to throw away and I don’t have to kill any extra trees,” Armitage says. The labels C-wrap around the products, providing more room for product information and the company to be printed on the package. Soon, the company will take delivery on two more of the labelers. “It does with one label what used to take two labels to do,” and the machine doesn’t require changeover for various weights of products. It was also at the AMI show where Armitage kicked the tires on an 11,000lb. bowl chopper that he eventually bought. The equipment not only put productivity in high gear, but also improved the consistency of the sausage mixture. It reduced the time needed to mix 300 lbs. of sausage, ready for stuffMarc Cinque, owner of Hawthorne, NJbased Premio Foods (Photo Courtesy of
João Canziani)

ing into natural casings, from threeand-a-half minutes to just 20 seconds. “I’m always on the lookout for something that can help us, either with the quality of our product or by streamlining a process.” The company is also planning to install a plant-wide sanitation system of drop stations for foaming, sanitizing and hot water dispensing designed by Zep Inc., which has Armitage almost giddy. “I like knowing that I have one of the most modern plants in the industry.”

ing to school. “I guess you could say we learned the business starting from the loading docks,” Marc recollects. Eventually the two siblings would take over the business, after their father became too ill to run it. Marc recalls when he graduated from high school and it became quickly evident that he and Steve would be responsible for carrying on the family business, which at that time (in 1986) had 12 employees and annual sales of $1 million. In 1999 the Cinques changed the name of the company to Premio Foods Ital-

Italian sausage intelligence
Growing up in a family that owned and operated a meat processing business, Marc Cinque learned about working harder en route to learning to work smarter. Garden State Sausage was founded in 1956 and Marc’s father purchased it 12 years later. In high school, days for Marc and his younger brother, Steve, started at 2 a.m., when the two were expected to arrive at the Cinque’s Hawthorne, NJ-based processing plant and drive delivery routes for five hours each day before head-

“We learned the business starting from the loading docks.”
ian Sausage, on the advice of marketing guru, Al Reis. “This is the point where the business really took off,” Marc says. Premio Foods remains a privately held processor of fresh dinner sausage that has seen annual revenues grow to an estimated $140 million with approximately 400 employees.

26 • Meat&Poultry • February 2011 • www.MeatPoultry.com

http://www.MeatPoultry.com

Meat&Poultry - February 2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Meat&Poultry - February 2011