Family values, tradition and quality define Cedar Creek Beef Jerky
Story by Sara Schafer | Photos by Paul Newton
Long before they owned Cedar Creek Beef Jerky, brothers Kendall Burns and Justin Amick were helping build it one bag at a time. As children, they earned a penny for every label they applied to the company’s jerky packages. Their mother would bring home the bags and labels, and then the brothers went to work.
In 2010, the brothers’ connection to the business based in El Dorado Springs came full circle when they took over Cedar Creek Beef Jerky as their mother retired. More than 15 years later, they are two of only four people who know the company’s secret jerky recipe.
“Our jerky is the old-fashioned style,” Justin says. “We don’t do any of the grinded or form-pressed jerky. It’s actually made from whole muscle — as jerky should be.”
Founded in 1984, Cedar Creek Beef Jerky remains a small USDA-inspected facility that produces five flavors of jerky. Each flavor — original, peppered, hot, teriyaki and hot-t-yaki — has its own distinct bag color.
“We get a lot of people who call and just say, ‘I want the red bag,’ ” Justin says. “They can’t remember what it’s called, but they remember the color.”
Recipe for Success
Every week, a truck delivers between 3,000 and 5,000 pounds of beef to Cedar Creek Beef Jerky’s facility, which is served by Sac Osage Electric Cooperative. They use one beef supplier and only buy one cut — whole muscle.
“For jerky, the leaner the better,” Kendall says.
Once the beef arrives, the work begins for the company’s 10 full-time and two part-time employees. One employee spends his shift slicing the meat into thin strips that will eventually become jerky.
The sliced meat is combined with marinade in a tumbler. As the machine rotates for 15 to 20 minutes, the marinade penetrates the meat and it becomes more tender. “You kind of mix it all up like you would cake batter,” Justin says.
After tumbling, the meat rests overnight in a walk-in cooler. The next morning, employees spread the strips across stainless-steel screens, load them onto rolling racks and wheel them into one of three walk-in ovens.
The jerky is cooked at 161 degrees and 90 percent humidity. This process shrinks the meat strips by 40 to 60 percent. After cooking, the jerky is cooled, snipped to size and packaged in vacuum-sealed bags.
“It’d be a whole lot easier and cheaper for us to make it a different way, but I think we would lose all of our customer base,” Justin says.
From southwest Missouri, the jerky is shipped coast to coast. It is sold in small grocery store chains, gas stations and bars. The heaviest market saturation, Justin says, is in Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Kansas.
While the jerky-making process has stayed mostly the same for the last four decades, Justin and Kendall have made a few upgrades. First, the bags that feature the large tagline “Made in Missouri” no longer require hand labeling. They’ve also fast-tracked the slicing and snipping process, which has knocked hours off the process.
These improvements keep their team happy, which is made up largely of family members. “I’ve got two of my boys working here, my aunt takes orders and my cousins are back there bagging and stuff,” Justin says. “Only a few people here aren’t related to us.”
Built to Last
Justin and Kendall are carrying on their mother’s legacy at the business. She joined it in 1993 and then transitioned to running the day-to-day operations. After high school, both brothers pursued other careers before taking over the jerky business. They’ve seen its scale dramatically increase over the years.
“Whenever we first came back and were working with Mom, we were working three days a week and doing about 400 pounds a day of wet product,” Justin says. “Now we run five days a week and do double the meat processing a day.”
Growth has brought new challenges. They paid about $1.89 per pound for their beef when they became owners in 2010. Today they pay around $6 per pound, and market prices fluctuate daily.
Even with these changes, the team remains committed to producing the high-end beef jerky their customers have learned to expect. “We have a lot of pride in our product,” Kendall says.
Nearly four decades after Cedar Creek Beef Jerky was founded, Justin and Kendall continue balancing growth with tradition. The brothers who once labeled bags for pocket change are now leading the company into its next delicious chapter.
To learn more about Cedar Creek Beef Jerky, call 800-359-9130 or visit www.cedarcreekbeefjerky.com.
Email Sara Schafer at
sschafer@ruralmissouri.coop.