Natural Prairie Poultry’s petition for Bankruptcy 11 chapter has been brushed aside amid objections from collectors.
The petition was once filed in U.S. Chapter Court docket for the District of Minnesota on September 20.
The corporate, headquartered in Charles Town, Iowa, has been in trade since 2021, when it bought a shuttered poultry plant that was once prior to now operated by way of Merely Necessities earlier than it closed it in 2019.
KCHA reported that the petition indexed Natural Prairie Poultry as having property between $50 million and $100 million, however liabilities between $100 million and $500 million with between 200 and 999 collectors.
The corporate sought post-petition financing of $15 million in “debtor in ownership (DIP) financing” to be able to make sure persisted operations all over this situation because it implements a sale procedure. The DIP financing, from Sandton Capitol, was once contingent upon Sandton getting “senior secured standing” in order that claims they had been owed by way of Natural Poultry can be paid earlier than any others.
Alternatively, a lot of collectors filed objections to the plan and a listening to to brush aside the chapter submitting was once held.
Tracy Miller, senior director of name and advertising and marketing for Natural Prairie stated in a commentary launched to KCHA stated: “With out the ones approvals, the chapter courtroom may just no longer approve our preliminary plan of reorganization, so we now have requested the courtroom to brush aside our submitting, a movement that was once granted Friday afternoon.”
Miller added, “We proceed to pursue the expressions of hobby from a number of possible patrons and to search for restructuring choices outdoor of the courts. As we accomplish that, we will be able to curtail or droop operations to preserve money and to satisfy our commitments to high quality and wholesomeness.”
All Natural Prairie Poultry staff are nonetheless hired by way of the corporate, Miller stated, however all contract staff employed by way of native staffing companies are now not operating on the plant.
Natural Prairie Poultry describes itself as an organization that delivers top rate high quality hen merchandise to retail, deli, and foodservice segments. It says its merchandise are “all herbal, air-chilled, and well-trimmed,” and “come from chickens raised underneath strict animal welfare requirements, with out a antibiotics ever, and fed a vegetable- and grain-based nutrition.”
The plant in 2023 won investment to renovate and replace the plant, with $37.6 million coming within the type of a mortgage packaged, assured by way of the USA Division of Agriculture (USDA) during the Meals Provide Chain Assured Mortgage Program. Better Industrial Lending (GCL), facilitated the mortgage.
Brian Roelofs is the president and CEO of the corporate, and others that were named to its management group have had years of enjoy with different previous and provide poultry corporations, together with Foster Farms, Tyson Meals, Petaluma Poultry, GNP Corporate, Prairie’s Best possible Farms and Zacky Farms.