Red Plains has grand opening

Donning lab coats, hair nets and hard hats, members of the Comanche Chamber of Commerce got a tour of the city’s newest business last Friday.

Trey Clinkenbeard, owner of Red Plains Grand Butchery, talked about the spotless and impressive facility as the tour group moved from room to room.

Each room had a specific purpose as not to cross contanimate and every stage of production is thoughtfully laid out.

“Our top priorities are worker safety, food safety and visitor safety,” Clinkenbeard said.

City manager Chuck Ralls was impressed with what he saw during the tour.

“I had seen it during our initial inspections for compliance and you get one impression, but to see it in operation and how things flow in their capacity, I was completely blown away,” Ralls said. “It was so much more than what I had envisioned in my head based on initial conversations, and the fact that they’re wanting to expand into other product lines is really encouraging because I think that’s going to bring a lot of people into the community that would typically not have a reason to come here.”

It is one of the best processing plants he has seen in the area.

“I’m blown away by what Trey and his team have put together and the professionalism because I’ve been in several different processing facilities, the one in Goldsby, one in Rush Springs and this is high class,” Ralls said.

Clinkenbeard admitted it wasn’t always easy, but under the circumstances it could have been worse.

“It’s been going good,” Clinkebeard said. “Weve got a lot of really, really good people working for us and they’ve made everything go really smooth, all things considered for this business.”

Clinkenbeard said Red Plains is picking up new business every day.

“We are moving into shipping operations and I think that’s going to open up a lot of avenues for us,” Clinkenbeard said. “A lot of the bigger ranchers, they could come and drop 20 cattle off and never touch it again. We will get it to their customers here.”

Though the plans haven’t been finalized as of last Friday, he is trying to secure a building downtown that will be used as additional freezer space so that they will be able to ship for customers.

There were several sides of beef hanging in one of the rooms, but that is about to change. They were scheduled to receive buffalo on Monday and later in September, they will be able to process pigs, goats and sheep. Beginning in October, they will be able to accept wild game for processing.

The butchery currently employs 25 people and while the day-to-day intake varies, Clinkenbeard says they are averaging about five cows a day and they would like to get it up to around 15 a day.

Most of the current customers are local. The farthest customer has been from Davis.

“We want to make it more efficient for people,” Clinkenbeard said. “I’m in talks with people out of southeastern Oklahoma. We want to make it efficient to where if they do have to travel a long distance they will have to only do it once. That way they can save on fuel costs and make multiple trips a year.”

They do have some equipment on back order that will be even more beneficial to the butchery, but they already have eveything they need for the basics.

“We have everything we need for the job, now let’s make it more efficient,” Clinkenbeard said. “That’s kind of what we’re waiting on. I was blessed with E&W Construction as our contractor. WW Paul Scales were a big help. They came down and helped us in a pinch. Like I said, all things considered, it’s been pretty darn smooth.”