Meat Co-Packing & Private Label — Stittsworth Smokehouse

Meat. Locally.™·Bemidji, MN·Free Shipping Over $125 · Ships Frozen from Bemidji This Week

Wholesale · Co-Packing & Private Label

Your brand. Our smokehouse.

We make the meat. You sell it. Stittsworth co-packs and private-labels brats, summer sausage, snack sticks, and jerky for snack brands, D2C startups, and retail labels.

Most meat snack brands don’t own a USDA-inspected facility. They can’t — the capex is in the millions and the operating knowledge takes generations to build. What they do is design a brand, develop a recipe, and find a co-packer to make the product.

Stittsworth is that co-packer for a small set of brands. We’ve been making real sausage and smoked meat in our Bemidji facility for four generations. The same equipment and recipes that produce Stittsworth-branded product can produce yours.

Two Models

Pick your fit.

Co-Packing

You bring the recipe (or develop it with us). We make it to your spec under your brand. Your packaging, your label, your name. You control marketing, distribution, and sales.

Best for: established brands wanting to launch a new SKU, D2C startups scaling past their kitchen, restaurant brands turning their signature into retail product.

Private Label

You pick from our existing recipes (or modest variants). We produce under your label. Faster than co-packing because product development is already done.

Best for: grocery chains wanting a store-brand SKU, gift companies needing a meat product to round out their box, regional brands launching their first meat line.

What We Can Make

Our smokehouse capabilities.

  • · Snack sticks — beef, pork, beef-pork blends, sheep casings, various flavors
  • · Summer sausage — 1-lb and 2-lb logs, fibrous casing, multiple flavor profiles
  • · Beef jerky and strips — whole muscle, sliced, marinated, smoked, vacuum-sealed
  • · Bratwurst — fresh or cooked, natural casings, retail pack or bulk
  • · Ring bologna — classic underrated category
  • · Smoked bacon — thick-cut, applewood or hickory

The Process

From inquiry to first production run.

1. Discovery call.

You tell us your product, your volume, your timeline. We tell you whether it’s a fit for our capabilities and our schedule.

2. Recipe development or matching.

Co-pack: we work from your recipe or develop one together. Private label: we walk you through our existing recipes and tweak as needed.

3. Pilot run.

Small production batch for sampling, packaging approval, and shelf-life testing.

4. Production agreement.

MOQs, pricing, lead time, packaging, labeling, IP terms. Signed before first commercial run.

5. Ongoing production.

Scheduled production runs to your forecast. We make, you sell.

Honest About Fit

Who we’re NOT a fit for.

We’re a real butcher shop, not a 50-million-pound contract manufacturer. We’re not the right co-packer for:

  • · Brands needing 100,000+ unit production runs
  • · Brands wanting the lowest possible cost regardless of quality
  • · Brands building around mechanically separated meat or extruded products
  • · Brands needing extremely long shelf life through heavy preservative loads

We’re the right fit for brands building around real ingredients, real recipes, and a real story.

Part of the Wholesale Buyer’s Guide series. See also: Private Label overview.

Let’s talk about your brand.

Call (218) 751-1320 or submit a co-pack inquiry. We’ll get back within two business days.

Co-Pack Inquiry