 The Cudahy Packing Plant, located at 2300 N. Broadway Street in Wichita, Kansas. The property is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. | |
| Industry | Meat packing |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1887 |
| Founders | Michael Cudahy |
| Fate | Acquired in 1981 |
| Successor | Bar-S Foods Company |
Cudahy Packing Company was an American meat packing company established in 1887 as the Armour-Cudahy Packing Company and incorporated in Maine in 1915. [1] The Cudahy meatpacking business was acquired by Bar-S Foods Company in 1981. [2]
In 1887, Michael Cudahy, with the backing of Philip Danforth Armour, started the Armour-Cudahy packing plant in Omaha, Nebraska. [3]
Cudahy Packing Company was created in 1890 when Cudahy bought Armour's interest. [3] The company added branches across the country, including a cleaning products plant at East Chicago, Indiana, built in 1909. [3] In 1911, the company's headquarters were relocated from Omaha to Chicago. [3]
In 1905, Cudahy Packing Company introduced Old Dutch Cleanser. [4] In 1955, Purex acquired Old Dutch Cleanser from Cudahy. [5] The Greyhound Corporation acquired the consumer products business of Purex (which included Old Dutch Cleanser) in 1985 and was combined with Greyhound's Armour-Dial division, forming The Dial Corporation. [6] In December 2003, Dial was sold to Henkel for $2.9 billion. [7]
By 1922, Cudahy Packing Company was one of the largest packing houses in the United States with over $200 million in annual sales and 13,000 employees around the country. [3] and operations in South Omaha, Kansas City, Saint Joseph, Sioux City, Wichita, Memphis, East Chicago, Salt Lake City, and Los Angeles, as well as distribution operations in 97 cities. [1] The business was hit by the Great Depression, but the company still employed about 1,000 Chicago-area residents during the mid-1930s.
Following World War II, it moved its headquarters first to Omaha and then in 1956 to Phoenix, where it took the name Cudahy Company. In 1957, the company was one of 500 companies listed in the first S&P 500. [8]
The company was acquired by General Host in 1968. [3] [9]
The Cudahy meat packing business was sold to management in 1981 and renamed Bar-S Foods Company. [10] Bar-S Foods Company was acquired by the Mexican packer Sigma Alimentos in 2010. [11]
Philip Danforth Armour Sr. was an American meatpacking industrialist who founded the Chicago-based firm of Armour & Company. Born on a farm in upstate New York, he initially gained financial success when he made $8,000 during the California gold rush from 1852 to 1856. He later opened a wholesale soap business in Cincinnati, then moved it to Milwaukee.
The meat-packing industry handles the slaughtering, processing, packaging, and distribution of meat from animals such as cattle, pigs, sheep and other livestock. Poultry is generally not included. This greater part of the entire meat industry is primarily focused on producing meat for human consumption, but it also yields a variety of by-products including hides, dried blood, protein meals such as meat & bone meal, and, through the process of rendering, fats.
Patrick Cudahy Jr. ; March 17, 1849 – July 25, 1919) was an American industrialist in the meat packing business and a patriarch of the Cudahy family.
Michael Cudahy was an American industrialist who, along with two brothers, established the Cudahy Packing Company in 1890.
Armour & Company was an American company and was one of the five leading firms in the meat packing industry. It was founded in Chicago, in 1867, by the Armour brothers led by Philip Danforth Armour. By 1880, the company had become Chicago's most important business and had helped make Chicago and its Union Stock Yards the center of America's meatpacking industry. During the same period, its facility in Omaha, Nebraska, boomed, making the city's meatpacking industry the largest in the nation by 1959. In connection with its meatpacking operations, the company also ventured into pharmaceuticals and soap manufacturing, introducing Dial soap in 1948.
Fels-Naptha is an American brand of laundry soap manufactured by Summit Brands. The soap was originally created in 1893 by Fels and Company.
Henkel Corporation, doing business as Henkel North American Consumer Goods and formerly The Dial Corporation, is an American company based in Stamford, Connecticut. It is a manufacturer of personal care and household cleaning products and is a subsidiary of multinational company Henkel AG & Co. KGaA.
The United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA), later the United Packinghouse, Food and Allied Workers, was a labor union that represented workers in the meatpacking industry.
Dial is an American brand of soap, body wash and hand sanitizer manufactured by Henkel North American Consumer Goods, the American subsidiary of Henkel AG & Co. KGaA. It was the world's first antibacterial soap.
Morris and Company, was one of several meatpacking companies in Chicago, Illinois, and in South Omaha, Nebraska.
Viad Corp provides experiential leisure travel and face-to-face events in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Europe, and the United Arab Emirates via two divisions: GES and Pursuit.
Sigma Alimentos, S.A. de C.V., also known as Sigma or Sigma Alimentos, is a Mexican multinational food processing and distribution company headquartered in San Pedro, near Monterrey, Mexico. It produces and distributes refrigerated foods, mainly lunch meats, cheeses, and yogurts. It is one of the largest producers and distributors of refrigerated foods in Mexico, some of its well-known brands are Fud, Chen, San Rafael, Guten, and Yoplait. It is a subsidiary of the Mexican industrial conglomerate Alfa.
The Union Stockyards of Omaha, Nebraska, were founded in 1883 in South Omaha by the Union Stock Yards Company of Omaha. A fierce rival of Chicago's Union Stock Yards, the Omaha Union Stockyards were third in the United States for production by 1890. In 1947 they were second to Chicago in the world. Omaha overtook Chicago as the nation's largest livestock market and meat packing industry center in 1955, a title which it held onto until 1971. The 116-year-old institution closed in 1999. The Livestock Exchange Building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999.
The economy of Omaha, Nebraska is linked to the city's status as a major commercial hub in the Midwestern United States since its founding in 1854. Dubbed the "Motor Mouth City" by The New York Times, Omaha is widely regarded as the telecommunications capital of the United States. The city's economy includes agriculture, food processing, insurance, transportation, healthcare and education. Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway has lived in Omaha all of his life, as have the ConAgra Foods, Union Pacific Railroad and Mutual of Omaha Companies, and Kiewit Corporation, all Fortune 500 corporations.
Purex is a brand of laundry detergent and laundry-related products manufactured by Henkel North American Consumer Goods and marketed in the United States and Canada. Purex is one of the most widely used laundry detergents in North America. Its original product, Purex Bleach, was a major competitor to Clorox bleach. The brand name is also used for a line of in-wash "fragrance booster" products called Purex Crystals. The Purex Crystals brand was originally launched as an in-wash fabric softener product.
OSI Group is an American privately owned holding company of meat processors that service the retail and food service industries with international headquarters in Aurora, Illinois. It operates over 65 facilities in 17 countries. Sheldon Lavin was the owner, CEO and chairman until his death in May 2023.
The Swift & Co. meatpacking plant in Sioux City, in the state of Iowa in the Midwestern United States, was built in 1918–19 as a speculative venture under the name Midland Packing Plant. After going into receivership, it was acquired by Swift & Co. in 1924, and continued to operate until 1974. It was then purchased by a Sioux City businessman and converted to an enclosed mall, the KD Stockyards Station. The building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
The Campofrio Food Group, known simply as Campofrío, is a prominent Spanish multinational food company based in Alcobendas, Spain, that produces different kinds of processed meat products. The company was founded in Burgos by José Luis Ballvé in 1952.
John Plankinton was an American businessman. He is noted for expansive real estate developments in Milwaukee, including the luxurious Plankinton House Hotel designed as an upscale residence for the wealthy. He was involved with railroading and banking. The Plankinton Bank he developed became the leading bank of Milwaukee in his lifetime. He was involved in the development of the Milwaukee City Railroad Company, an electric railway.
General Host Corp. was a New York-based food and food-related company. It was also the owner of Frank's Nursery & Crafts until the company's bankruptcy in 2004.
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