Press Releases
Microbiologist Sangita Jalukar, Ph.D., is a member of Vi-COR®’s research and development staff at the company’s headquarters in Mason City, Iowa. Over the past decade, Vi-COR has developed a unique line of yeast products for livestock feed that, for the first time in the industry, provides guaranteed metabolites that result in consistent livestock performance.
January 13, 2010
Yeast Culture Manufacturer Vi-COR Focuses on Innovation & Grows the Business
MASON CITY, Iowa—Vi-COR®, a manufacturer of yeast culture products for swine, poultry and dairy feed, has spent the past decade proving that yeast culture is not a commodity feed additive and enjoying the growth that came with that revelation.
For over 60 years prior to Vi-COR’s entrance into the yeast industry, livestock producers had been offered yeast-based products with nebulous performance claims. It was accepted that fermented yeast improved livestock digestion and health, but no one knew why. At that time, there were only a few manufacturers of yeast products for livestock feed and they offered only one product. Rather than innovate and improve their product, they maintained the status quo.
When Vi-COR decided to enter the yeast industry in 1999, the company made the conscious decision to become more than just another yeast manufacturer offering the same product as everyone else. Vi-COR has grown 30 percent annually during its first decade, proving it is fulfilling a need among livestock producers. “We made a commitment to understand yeast and the reason it works,” says Mark Holt, Vi-COR’s CEO. “Once we developed this understanding, we further made the commitment to make better products.”
Through 10 years of university research, in-house laboratory testing and field trial work, Holt says the company knows now more than ever why yeast products work. “It’s fun to see competitive manufacturers running down the innovations at Vi-COR, only to fall in line and copy our innovative efforts,” says Holt.
Vi-COR’s Celmanax® is a testament to the fact that yeast is not a commodity. “Through Celmanax, we have accomplished what the old guard yeast manufacturers said couldn’t be done,” says Holt. Specifically, Vi-COR’s Celmanax offers leading-edge technology—the most concentrated, university-tested, field proven product available—with a guarantee of metabolite levels. A guaranteed level enables dairy farmers to produce consistent livestock performance. For the first time in the history of the industry, Vi-COR has qualified and quantified the metabolites of yeast fermentation and their benefits to livestock.
In addition to developing innovative additives for livestock feed, Vi-COR also offers Milk to the Max, a free bilingual program for Vi-COR customers to educate dairy employees on cow physiology, cow comfort and proper procedures for milking cows. This program has proven especially beneficial to dairy producers with somatic cell count issues.
Contact:
Nancy Crist
J.W. Morton & Associates
319-378-1081, x22
