01/25/08 Nolan Ryan beef

Nolan Ryan is pitching more than fastballs these days. I'm Jeff Keane; I'll be back in one minute with the story. An article in the Western Farmer-Stockman by Alan Newport proves baseball legend; Nolan Ryan can be just as successful in the beef industry as he was a major league baseball pitcher. Instead of serving up screaming fastballs to hitters, Nolan Ryan is now the front man for Nolan Ryan Beef, which supplies grocery outlets Nolan Ryan Guaranteed Tender Beef. The 35-member company sells select-grade steaks, roasts, hamburgers, and some cooked products. Starting out about ten years ago with sales of less than one million dollars, Nolan Ryan Beef will sell almost 20 million dollars worth of beef this year. Consistency of product is the basis of the company and is achieved by science-based production and processing protocols. Some of these include no antibiotics given in the last 100 days preharvest, no growth hormones used last 100 days, 75,000 international units of vitamin E administrated prior to slaughter for extending beef shelf life, sorting tender carcasses with light reflectance technology, and aging carcasses at least 14 days postharvest. Attention to these protocols and others must be working since CEO Charlie Bradbury figures out of the 20 million dollars in sales possibly 1,000 dollars would be the amount of product returns. Sounds like Nolan Ryan Beef produces beef with the same strong commitment that Nolan Ryan the pitcher gave baseball. I'm Jeff Keane. Western Farmer-Stockman January 2008