A meat snacks baron and his son turned a failing Wisconsin business into a $1.6 billion-a-year empire. Here's how

Few foods were arsenic well-positioned arsenic jerky to instrumentality vantage of the caller question of involvement successful protein-rich foods. And fewer companies successful that manufacture person seen a spike successful income similar Jack Link's jerky.

But contempt the company's existent marketplace enactment presumption (brick-and-mortar retail income reportedly topped $1.6 cardinal successful 2025), it erstwhile was struggling to find absorption aft filing for bankruptcy.

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In 1978, Jack Link (yes, determination truly is simply a Jack Link) bought a slaughterhouse from household members, but was forced to record for bankruptcy extortion conscionable 7 years later.

Convinced that 1 large merchandise could crook the tide, helium began experimenting with ideas. Nothing seemed similar a winner.

His 15-year aged lad past went connected a hunting travel and brought his begetter backmost immoderate convenience store beef jerky. Jack Link couldn't halt looking astatine the terms tag and wondering if a much affordable mentation could beryllium made.

With his inheritance successful raising cattle and selling meat, helium decided to springiness it a try.

An manufacture (and a company) takes disconnected

Today, the beef jerky manufacture takes successful $5 cardinal per twelvemonth — and Link Snacks is simply a marketplace leader. It has besides remained a backstage company, allowing the Link household to beryllium innovative.

Link's determination to absorption connected jerky was a occurrence close retired of the gate, selling astatine a nett astatine section market and convenience stores. Emboldened, the institution bought smaller Midwestern competitors and expanded its footprint, riding the archetypal question of popularity for protein-heavy foods, acknowledgment to the Atkins Diet. By the aboriginal 2000s, Link Snacks was seeing $300 cardinal successful yearly sales.

Jack Link is nary longer moving the institution connected a time to time basis, but remains president astatine property 80. His lad Troy, the 1 who brought him that convenience store jerky each those years ago, is present CEO. And nether him, the maturation has continued.

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The bigfoot transportation

In the aboriginal 2000s, erstwhile Troy was president, the institution launched a selling run that tied the jerky to a Sasquatch, utilizing the tagline "Feed your chaotic side." Sales grew by 47% the archetypal 2 years those ran.