CHESTER — A facility by the name of 'Prairie Meats' opened for business in October of 2022 in the community of Lothair west of Chester.
The Diemert family spent 15 months putting together their meat processing facility along with some American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds to give them an extra hand.
After a year of hard work, they are looking to make a name for themselves in the Hi-Line, with the goal of better serving the Montana agriculture community.
Last month, the Hi-Line Harvest Festival took place in the town of Chester where Prairie Meats hosted a steak competition during the event.
"The steak competition is a collection of the best steaks that went through Prairie Meats this year in 2023," said Clark Diemert. We started collecting October 15th at the open house. From there, we got up to 14 steaks. My criteria being a good fed beef."
More than 100 people showed up, with several judges determining the best quality steaks.
Brett Henke has seen Prairie Meats grow over the last year and spoke on the Diemerts' success.
"It's been really cool to see it start out from start to finish," Henke said. "He (Clark) had this idea a few years ago, and now it's actually an operating business. They built the shop and people are responding to it well. It's great to see people in the community supporting it ... It's cool to see stuff happening in the area, instead of stuff shutting down. We need more stuff like this happening in Ag around here in small communities."
People in the area discussed how beneficial it is to have a meat processing facility within a close radius. Now that Prairie Meats is entering its second year in business, Clark sees more opportunities.
"We're working on obtaining state inspection," Clark said.
He added, "We'll hopefully get granted our marks of inspection on the 12th, and our first scheduled steaks kill on the 19th."
Prairie Meats is at 3779 Road 100 E in Lothair; click here to visit the Facebook page.
