Now booking all dates for 2025 and 2026

Email: bookings@meatworkswestport.com

Update as of 5/1/2025

Dear Valued Producer,

Apologies for the duplication of this email. Due to an error in the original fee structure, we have reissued the corrected version. Thank you for your understanding.”

As we prepare for the busy season ahead, we want to thank you for your continued support and partnership. Your trust in Meatworks and The Livestock Institute of Southern New England means the world to us.

As you know, the past two years have brought about steady increases in the cost of doing business for everyone, from spices and packaging materials to general operating expenses. In response, we have made some updates to our 2025 Fee Structure. We’ve worked hard to keep all price increases to a minimum while ensuring that we maintain the high quality and service you expect from us.

What’s New in 2025:

  • Updated Pricing: Our new pricing structure reflects modest increases that help offset rising costs in materials and processing. CORRECTION ATTACHED. Click HERE to review.
  • Cancellation Policy: Appointments canceled within 21 days of the scheduled date and No-Shows will now incur a cancellation/no-show fee. However, if you reschedule within 45 days, those fees will be waived. Click HERE to review.
  • Return Policy: All product issues, including damaged packaging, must be reported to us within 24 hours of pickup to be eligible for review or credit.  Click HERE to review.
  • Sausage Flavor Return!: Back by popular demand. Maple flavoring. Yes, that’s right, maple. Your feedback matters, and we heard you loud and clear.  Timing is everything, and making sausage takes time, slowing down production.  This will be reviewed during our peak season.
  • Smoked Jowls: We know how important value-added opportunities are to our producers, and we’re always listening. Smoked jowls are back to help you make the most of every animal.
  • Conventional Cure: To be more efficient, the smoke team considered phasing out the conventional cure.  While flavoring, whether through spices, cure, and smoke, adds value, it also requires substantial time to clean and transition between batches.  This slows down production, particularly during peak season.  However, we recognize how important these value-added products are to our producers, and we remain committed to supporting your diverse needs.
  • New Cut Sheets: All cut sheets have been updated and will be available on our website on or before May 1st, http://www.meatworkswestport.com/cutting-instructions/.
  • New Beef Cut Sheet Selections: We’re also excited to introduce three new beef cut sheets designed to make your and your customers’ selections easier:

We encourage you to review the updated documents and reach out with any questions. Our team is always here to help you find the best options for your product and market.

These updates are essential for keeping Meatworks strong and sustainable, and we truly appreciate your understanding and support as we continue to grow together.

From the Meatworks Staff

IMPORTANT MESSAGE from Keith Wilda, CEO and Plant Manager

August 28, 2024

Greetings from Meatworks!

It’s now the end of August, the unofficial end of summer, and the official start to Meatworks’ busy season, we want to thank you for your continued support. As we forecasted ( and notified in previous updates), we are currently fully booked for most of September, all of October and November, and December is filling up quickly. With that said if you have a booking during those months then it is very important to know that we have cancellation fees that will be applied in the following situations; no-shows, showing up with fewer animals than you booked, and cancellations within 21 days of your scheduled booking.

If you know you won’t be able to keep your appointment, have fewer animals than scheduled, or are unsure of your appointment date then please call us.  We are maintaining a wait list so as people cancel, we may be able to accommodate those waiting for appointments.  Notify Meatworks of any changes to your appointments so we can book someone else.  Please don’t bring more animals than you scheduled, this leads to an overcrowded barn and we will have to turn you away.

I apologize now for any inconvenience this may cause if you have not booked yet, many of these bookings are from loyal customers who stayed with us during the shutdown and reopening.  As mentioned in previous updates we have to keep our books full to keep the lights on, and we greatly appreciate all the folks that have stuck with us through reopening and the many new farms that have signed on with us during this time. We appreciate your understanding and patience during this upcoming busy time.

Since reopening we have had shorter processing times, higher yields, and added 8 to 9 new farms a month as word spreads. All this success is thanks to our staff stepping up and learning new areas of the facility. The staff is motivated through our cross-training program and through the positive feedback you share with us.  We continue looking at ways to streamline and speed up our processing to make room and increase throughput.

You take pride in what you produce, as we take pride in getting you the best end result. In order to do that we need you to give completed cut sheets at the time of drop off. Cut sheets can be tricky to fill out, so please ask our staff for assistance.   If cut sheets are not filled out or are filled out incorrectly, we will make one attempt to contact you. If we are trying to contact you at this point it means your animal is in the processing room, and we need to move them through quickly, so if we do not get you on the phone, will be left to the discretion of our butchers.  

A final note with “busy season” comes a crowded storage freezer. So we ask that when we call you for pick up, please come and pick up. We will be enforcing late charges on pallets left after 5 business days ( Saturday is a business day here). As many of you know, having an added freezer truck on your farm is expensive.  This is an expense that we can not justify at this time.  If you’re unable to pick up your products within this timeframe, we can arrange for them to be moved to a local storage facility at an additional cost.

Thank you all for your support !!!!

Keith

May 21, 2024

The reopening of Meatworks is met with challenges and opportunities for The Livestock Institute and our community. Reopenings are always a challenge, but a restart of a community-driven organization that has hard times should be seen as an opportunity. It is an opportunity for new ideas, process changes, and new staff. Today I report to you as the new CEO, wearing the hat of Executive Director of TLI and Plant Manager of Meatworks, we are back open, and we have made some changes.

Although some of the faces you may see here at the plant will look the same because they are the real talent, there have been process changes made in both facility operations and personnel responsibilities. Currently, Meatworks is operating with a streamlined staff during restart in order to cross-train staff in multiple areas as part of our quality control improvements. Quality checks will be happening at every phase of processing; from the day the animals are received into our humane animal holding facility to when you, the producer, pick up your order or the customer leaves our onsite retail store.

I invite the community to visit us at the facility. We are currently still taking bookings and

have been since reopening. We are here to serve you by bringing high-quality protein products to our local community here in Southern New England. Please feel free to call or email me with questions or a time to come see the facility.

Hope to see you here!

Keith Wilda

IMPORTANT MESSAGE from TLI’s President

March 26, 2024

The Livestock Institute of Southern New England is extremely pleased to announce the hiring of Keith Wilda to be the Chief Executive Officer of the entire organization.

Keith is well-known throughout Massachusetts agriculture and fishery industries, most recently as Chief Operating Officer of Great Falls Aquaculture LLC, a 18,000+ pounds/week company with USDA and HACCP certification. Keith’s extensive and varied experiences in operations made him the ideal candidate, and we are looking forward to working with him as we restructure and restart TLI/Meatworks. Please welcome Keith.

More info at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keith-wilda-6a990551/

Jon

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“Clean, humane, knowledgeable, and very friendly and accommodating to our fast pace beef and pork business. More retail cuts to market at our farmstand. The packaging and labeling are very professional, makes meats even more marketable which means more clients and more profit. Thank you for everything.”
– Ann Marie Bouthillette, Blackbird Farm, Smithfield, RI

“Working with individual farmers, the staff is totally engaged in high-quality customer service and humane treatment of the animals.  They understand how important tracking animals through the facility is to ensure that every pound of my animal comes back with my farm name on it.”
– Ben Coerper, Wild Harmony Farm, Exeter, RI

“I really appreciate this state-of-the-art facility and its accommodating staff. Trailering livestock has never been easier.”
– Suze Craig, Case Mill Farm, Westport, MA

“We are happy with the humane way our animals are handled, and our meat is always cut and packaged nicely.”
– Elizabeth Frary, Copicut Farms, Dartmouth, MA

“I’ve used six USDA-inspected facilities, and Meatworks tops them all with a state-of-the-art facility and tracking system, no stress animal handling, and people who care about my business and work with me to accommodate my needs.”
– Carter Wilkie, Little Compton, RI

Meatworks is a new state-of-the art USDA-Inspected multi-species meat processing facility for cattle, hogs, sheep, and goats.

Offering services with:
• The highest animal welfare and humane handling standards
• The highest food safety standards
• Full traceability from drop off to pick-up via our integrated scale system
• Vacuum packaging
• Value-added services:
     • Patties
     • Fresh bulk sausages
     • Fresh or smoked linked sausage
     • Conventional or naturally cured bacon and ham

***ONSITE RETAIL STORE***
Featuring a selection of fresh, locally raised beef, pork, and lamb.
We hope to see you soon!

Join Our Team!

Retail Clerk

Skilled Meat Cutters

Barn Help

Training Available!

Meatworks is owned and operated by The Livestock Institute of Southern New England, a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to addressing issues facing livestock farmers through educational programming and infrastructure improvements.
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This institution is an equal opportunity provider and employer.