Cooper Farms started in the 1930's with only 300 turkeys. Fast forward to today where Cooper Farms raises and produces millions of pounds of hogs, chickens and turkeys. The company stretches all over western Ohio including their four main locations in Oakwood, Fort Recovery, St. Henry and Van Wert. What you may not know is the turkey holiday is no busier a time than the rest of the year for Cooper Farms.
"We actually don’t raise whole birds for thanksgiving," COO Gary Cooper said. "A lot of people think boy you're really busy this time of year, well not actually we’re just as busy every week of the year. We raise turkeys for the deli markets, so the deli meat counters in Meijers and Kroger and Walmart and those kind of places. We also do Bob Evans and Chile's and some Subway shops. So we do quite a few different types of deli meats but we don’t do any whole birds for thanksgiving."
400 family contractors, or growers, are part of the Cooper Farms turkey system. This is where the turkeys are raised before heading to the market. These farms usually raise about 100,000 tom turkeys a year. Collectively, they raise around six million annually. That comes out to 270 million pounds of turkey a year.
"So when we raise turkeys we actually, we have breeders," Cooper said. "They lay the hatching eggs that we put in our hatch. It takes about 28 days to hatch a turkey. And then it takes about 21 weeks to raise these toms up to about 45 to 48 pounds."
"Here on my farm I’m basically kind of the care taker," Dan Stose, a Manager of Cooper Farms said. "I go through the barns. I check and make sure everything is working correctly. Fans, feed lines, water lines. Just taking care of the birds and making sure everything is working the way it should be."
The birds may not take part in Thanksgiving but Cooper Farms still does its part for the holiday. Cooper said that they donate turkey meat to the Feast of Harvest, in Dayton, among other charitable events.
