Sanderson Farms tries to grow market share

Sanderson Farms, Inc. will expand their Collins, Mississippi, poultry processing facility and hatchery to process product exclusively for the big bird deboning market. The $20 million project will include an expansion of the Collins hatchery, retrofitting certain equipment in the Collins processing plant and the construction of a new feed mill.

Joe F. Sanderson, Jr., chairman and c.e.o. of Sanderson Farms, said, "Our new Georgia facility will be dedicated exclusively to serving retail customers and our new state-of-the-art poultry complex is closer to our growing list of customers located in the southeast. With the conversion of the Collins plant to a larger weight bird, and the additional capacity of 150,000 head per week created by the expansion project, Sanderson Farms will add approximately 2.2 million pounds per week of fresh chicken processing capacity, approximately a 7.3% increase over current capacity."

Not said was where Sanderson intends to sell the additional capacity in a market with limited growth potential.