AU meat lab: Feeding the public, teaching a trade

Daniel Chesser-The Auburn Villager Pete Holloway, a full-time butcher at the Auburn University Lambert-Powell Meats Laboratory, processes a steer (a castrated bull).

Auburn University is serving beef, pork and eggs with a side of research at the Lambert-Powell Meats Laboratory.

"We are responsible for the teaching, research and extension activities related to food animals (cattle, hogs, sheep and goats) and horses," said Barney Wilborn, manager of the AU meat lab.

The lab opened along with its retail-salesroom in 2004, processing and providing fresh cuts of pork and beef as well as bacon, different varieties of sausage, and on occasion, a selection of barbeque, smoked brisket and hams to the general public.

"If you slaughter red-meat animals and sell to the public you have to be under inspection." Wilborn said. "This plant is a state-inspected plant so we are actually inspected by the Alabama Department of Agriculture and Industries instead of the U.S.D.A.; which the rules and expectations are exactly the same. The difference is we are not allowed to ship across state-lines."

The lab does not own a delivery truck and sells almost 100 percent of the meat slaughtered in-house with some of it being up for wholesale, according to Wilborn.

The profit from sales goes right back into the lab.

"There are no profits (laughs)," Wilborn said. "We operate on substantial financial assistance from the University for some of our bills and salaries, but we use the proceeds from our sales to fund the operation here.

"All of our student labor, supplies, packaging and ingredients are paid for by the dollars from the salesroom."

The whole operation is basically as self-supporting entity within the department with any leftover money going toward student-labor.

The prices are also typically lower on the products provided in the store at the meat lab than larger chain markets.

"One of the question we get a lot is 'where do your prices come from?'" Wilborn said. "There are a couple of answers to that. First I have to cover the cost of production, but then there is opportunity cost. If my cost of production is significantly less than what you might get a product for at the grocery store there is some area of opportunity there; not to mention supply and demand."

Bacon is the shining example of a popular high-demand item at the meat lab.

The facility includes the Stanley Wilson Beef Teaching Laboratory, which is located off Shug Jordan Parkway between Wire Road and College Street.

The lab belongs to the Department of Animal Science within the College of Agriculture and is open for sales Monday through Thursday 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Fridays.

The fields that surround the meat-processing plant and lab are home to 50 something pure-bred cattle at any given time.

The prime age for slaughter on a steer (a castrated bull) is almost 2 years old to ensure the right amount of tenderness since cattle grow tougher over time. The weight of a steer at slaughter normally weighs around 1,200 pounds, according to Wilborn.

This particular facility employs four full-time employees including two butchers, Wilborn as the lab manager and a sales-room manager along with roughly 10 students working and learning part-time to complete the staff.

Although Auburn's Animal Sciences program teaches students to become butchers, Wilborn said being good at the job is more of a trade and can even be considered an art since it is so meticulous.

"A cut of meat is really easy to ruin," Wilborn said. "There are a lot of opportunities for mistake."

Although Wilborn is not a butcher by trade, he has the knowledge of one with a bachelor's degree in Animal Sciences and a master's degree in Meat Science.

"I have a lot of school training and while I was in school here at Auburn I worked at the meat lab," Wilborn said. "So I got to work with some really good butchers and learn some things.

"As far as it being an art, it all depends on the individual butcher."

Being a butcher requires no certification, but their work will certainly speak for itself.

"I would say it is a lot like being a carpenter," Wilborn said. "Most carpenters have no formal training, but I am sure there are parts of the country that have trade organizations or unions.

"In general it is just practical experience."

Alex Tigue, in his second semester of graduate school in meat science, joked that being a butcher is five percent art and 95 percent confidence.

"These guys (the two full-time butchers) make it look really easy back there when they are slicing the meat," Tigue said. "I'll take an hour on one cut and still not get it right.

"There is a science to it, too, when it comes to knowing what you are doing and finding the right seams to cut."

While the lab sells red meat and eggs in its store it does not handle poultry or fish since Auburn University has separate departments to cover those aspects of food animals.

"Traditionally, going back to the old meat lab on Donahue Drive, our salesroom officially could market agricultural product it produced not necessarily on this campus, but from around the state," Wilborn said. "The College of Agriculture grows a variety of fruits and vegetables as well as harvest eggs from chickens, but we only sale the eggs now from the poultry farm down the street."

The meat lab is working with the Department of Poultry Science to bring back the sales of poultry at the lab on Shug Jordan, according to Wilborn.

Auburn University offers a bachelor's, a master's and Ph.D. in meat science.

A student with a bachelor's degree in this field can go to work in the meat, ingredient or the packaging industry as supervisors, quality assurance or food safety technicians after four years of education.

The students who seek out further education in meat science can go to work as research development specialist.