A group of ex-growers affiliated to the Dexter, MO complex have filed suit against Tyson Foods in the Circuit Court of Stoddard County, MO. The farmers allege that Tyson contemplated closing the complex as early as November 2021 in anticipation of the late 2023 formal announcement.

The farmers had no advance notice of the intended closure and undertook to spend capital on improvements thereby incurring debt.  Given the relative isolation of the Dexter, MO complex, the growers were essentially obligated to Tyson Foods as their only practical integrator. 

Fortuitously, Cal-Maine Foods has acquired the processing plant and will extend contracts to individual farmers to produce table eggs using modified housing. This action follows a similar the arrangement between Cal-Maine Foods and the growers contracted to Omtron following the 2012 bankruptcy arising from the 2010 acquisition of the Townsend’s Complex in Siler City, NC.