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Certified ... and successful: certification boosts meat and poultry sales, customer confidence. People will pay more for their favorite brand.

Article Excerpt
Today's consumer faces a baffling array of meat and poultry offerings at the meat counter. But questions abound: Where did the animal come from? Was it healthy? What did it eat? To steer customers toward satisfying choices, the certification process applies consistent standards to beef and other animal protein sources.

Larry Meadows, chief of Meat Grading and Certification Branch of USDA Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS), reports beef has more USDA certified branded programs than any other meats.

"In 1978, the USDA recognized specifications for the upper two-thirds of the USDA Choice grade, a maximum of thirty-months maturity, and beef-type conformation," he says. "The first beef brand to receive official USDA certification recognition was Certified Angus Beef[R] (CAB), which represents about forty-five percent of all carcasses certified. Almost all packers supply product to CAB," he states.

During the 1990s, numerous companies obtained certification. Excel Sterling Silver beef meets the same marbling requirements as CAB except...

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