Ranch Foods Direct

Ranch Foods Direct is a specialty meat company selling natural beef - raised without hormones or antibiotics - along with natural poultry, buffalo, eggs, cheese, Heritage Acres pork from Missouri's Ozark Mountain Pork Cooperative, lamb, seafood and many other high quality food items. Rancher Mike Callicrate opened the Colorado Springs business in 2003 to combine the best animal husbandry practices with innovative clean, safe processing methods and to emphasize the importance of localizing the food system. His goal is to produce superior quality beef while returning more profitability back to the farm and ranch. "Steroid use in baseball is a national issue, but meanwhile we're not even talking about the kids in the stands at the game who are eating hot-dogs from animals fed those same types of performance-enhancing drugs," he says.