August 17, 2005
Muskegon Chronicle
Dave Alexander, Business Editor

Funding from the state of Michigan and Fruitport Township will bring municipal water to a century-old food processor, allowing for a $2.1 million expansion that will bring a minimum of 40 new jobs.
Hazekamp Meats/Premier Foods is embarking on the multimillion dollar project as its production of processed fresh meats for Midwest grocery private brands continues to grow, president Dave Hazekamp said Tuesday.
The expansion includes a company investment of $850,000 in equipment and a planned 20,000-square-foot addition to the processing plant at 3933 S. Brooks in Fruitport Township.
Key to continuing the growth of the company is municipal water, Hazekamp said. Currently, the company is using well water.
The Michigan Economic Development Corp. has given Fruitport Township a $400,000 grant to extend water from Heights-Ravenna Road south down Brooks Road to Hazekamp Meats. The township has contributed $120,000 to extend the water — an effort that also helps nearby residences and brings the township closer to a “looped” water distribution system, township officials said.
The 5,500-foot extension of a 16-inch water line should be completed by the end of the year, township Deputy Supervisor Tim Tubergen said.
“We’ve been growing here in Fruitport on the strength of our local work force and the work ethic found in West Michigan,” Hazekamp said. The company currently has 135 full- and part-time employees. “We have committed to 40 new jobs but we are confident that there will be more.”
The fourth-generation, family-owned business founded by Bert Hazekamp Sr., began in 1905 as a small slaughter house for beef products in the city of Muskegon. It moved to its current location in 1965 and continued as a small slaughter house until 1990 when it employed only eight.
Dave Hazekamp began working for the family business in 1975 and took over the operation from his father Charles in 1992. Hazekamp has put together a management team that transformed the slaughter house into a modern food processing plant. The company is no longer in the slaughtering business.
Instead, Hazekamp — and its food distribution company Premier Foods — began producing and delivering ready-to-cook entrees, providing pre-packaged fresh meat products, including beef, pork, chicken and most recently seafood.
A typical Hazekamp product would be a stuffed chicken breast, breaded pork chop or a beef kabob. All of Hazekamp’s products are shipped fresh to the grocer’s shelves.
“What we produce today, we will ship tonight and it will be on our customer’s shelves tomorrow,” Hazekamp said.
The company distributes to customers throughout the upper Midwest, from Minnesota to Ohio. It supplies grocery chains like Meijer Inc. and D&W Food Stores, both headquartered in West Michigan.
The current round of expansion allows the company to broaden its product offerings and increase the volume of existing products, Hazekamp said. Specifically, grocers and their customers are demanding bulk packaged foods, so-called “family-packed” products for “value-oriented” consumers, Hazekamp said.
MEDC officials said that the Hazekamp expansion is just one of several companies that are in the hiring mode in Muskegon County.
“Hazekamp has been creating jobs in Michigan for the last century,” Gov. Jennifer Granholm said in a prepared statement announcing the state grant, which is a pass-through of federal money. “This grant will help them continue to invest in Fruitport, strengthening the community and its work force.”