About 100 people attended an open house for the newly added onto NEW Cooperative site in Cooper. 

CEO Dan Dix says the $50 million project was completed over two years, added 3 million bushels of grain storage, will produce livestock feed and a separate 10,000 tons of fertilizer facility on site. Dix tells Raccoon Valley Radio they decided on Cooper as their eighth feed mill operation among their 60 locations in Iowa following a conversation he had with the owner of a Morton building and a few acres as an opportunity to grow.

“It was kind of a ‘Build it and they will come’ strategy, which isn’t always the best strategy but in this case, boy the area producers responded. And this location now, which started out as agronomy only, has grown into one of our largest across our entire 60 locations across the state. And actually in the case of anhydrous ammonia is the single largest plant by volume that we have in our whole system.”   

Dix points out every bushel of corn that is brought into their facility will leave as poultry or swine feed, which needs about 10 million bushels of grain annually with the capacity to produce 600,000 tons of mash or pellet feed. He talks about how this facility will continue to push NEW Cooperative into the future.

“And really it’s an investment back into production agriculture. Across Iowa’s skyline you see a lot of elevators that were built in (the) 50s, 60s, and 70s. Today simply the farmer has outgrown his production capacity and the speed and space he needs, it’s tough to service it in some of these old elevators today that were built in the middle of a small town. And as you can see you look around here there’s not much around us. It’s just absolutely, couldn’t be more convenient for a producer to deliver into here.” 

Dix adds they will start manufacturing feed next week and the fertilizer facility will be in operation this fall. During his remarks, Dix thanked everyone who was involved with the project and who made it possible for them to expand their services into Greene County.