OC Mag 01-22

Woudstra Meat Market
nears 100 years in business
it about three years ago, but the timing
just wasn’t right,” Kim Hoogland
said. “Then around the end of last year
we tossed around the idea again and
things fell into place.”
It was a new idea that made the
move seem right this time around.
“We had been hesitant because of
the access to the alley. As time goes
on the bigger trailers get, the bigger
animals get, and it was just not convenient
to drop off animals in the back,
so we thought what if we would build
a different facility to take the processing
off-site and keep the meat market
downtown,” Hoogland said.
So that’s exactly what they’re doing.
They hope to be in their off-site processing
facility south of town by March
and in the meantime are doing custom
butchering at the shop downtown.
In the long run, after the required licensing
and inspection processes, they
Woudstra Meat Market was originally founded in 1925 by Jim Woudstra and new owners
Junior and Kim Hoogland, along with Steve and Vonda Post, look forward to continuing the
long-standing business’s legacy in downtown Orange City. An off-site processing facility, which
they hope to have ready this spring, will allow them to expand their options and capacity.
aim to market and sell meat from their
own livestock.
It will be the next evolution for a
business that began in 1925 when Jim
Woudstra first established the meat
market.
“It’s pretty amazing and the community
support has been very humbling,”
Hoogland said “We’ve had members
of the Woudstra family give us
their blessings and well-wishes
and that has meant a lot.”
The community has rallied
behind them, especially after
they answered two key questions.
“Were we going to keep the
name and were we going to
keep the recipes? Those were
some of the first questions we
had,” Hoogland said. “Once we
said yes to both of them it seems
a community team has been
formed to keep us encouraged
and supported. It’s been pretty
great.”
It’s those recipes that she believes
are some of the biggest keys to the
meat market’s long running success.
On the top of that list is the dried
beef.
“That has been known forever as
some of the best dried beef around,”
Hoogland said. “I think history has
paved the way for us and as long as
we keeping running with that we’ll be
fine.”
She said they plan to step all the way
back to the original recipes as she noted
some had been tweaked a bit over the
years.
And they will be cutting back on the
flavor options for the time being.
“We’re going to get down to five or
six that we can get to where people
think they’re amazing and then we
can expand our flavors from there,”
Hoogland said. “So we’re taking a
slower but simpler approach and trying
to stay really true to the Woudstra
reputation.”
Stocking the shelves currently are
28 OC MAGAZINE | SPRING 2022