AMPI

Project Description

Dean Snyder Construction crews helped double production on an 80-year-old cheese making facility with a new 14,000 square-foot precast addition to an existing Associated Milk Producers Inc. (AMPI) cheese plant. The addition includes 8 new state-of-the-art cheese vats and other processing equipment to allow the plant to be capable of producing 300,000 pounds of block cheese everyday.

“We are pleased with the performance of the new vats and the new space,” says AMPI Vice President of Technical Services Wayne Jorgenson. “This investment makes it possible for a talented team to make even more sought-after AMPI cheese.”

The improved cheese-making technology will increase the amount of cheese made from every pound of milk processed. The varieties of cheese produced will grow to include Monterrey Jack, Colby and Marble Jack. DSC crews also added a 2,200 SF addition and remodel to their whey processing and storage area. With the extra cheese they are producing, they needed additional storage for their whey product.

AMPI is headquartered in New Ulm, Minn., and owned by dairy farm families from Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota and North Dakota. In 2016, AMPI members marketed 5.5 billion pounds of milk, resulting in $1.6 billion in sales. AMPI owns 10 Midwest-based manufacturing plants where about 10 percent of the nation’s American-type cheese, butter and dried whey is produced. The cooperative’s award-winning cheese, butter and powdered dairy products are marketed to food service, retail and food ingredient customers.

ATURA architecture of Clear Lake provided design services on the project.