House of Raeford Farms, Rose Hill, N.C., announced plans to phase out all operations at its Raeford, N.C., turkey cook plant within the next 60 days to focus its attention and resources on chicken production.

The closure of the turkey cook plant comes as a result of historically high protein commodity market values. Production of further processed and fully cooked chicken products will be moved to other plants.

The company embarked on a strategy to grow its chicken production volume and further processed chicken product lines over a year ago.

“We’re experiencing significant growth in chicken production and further processing,” says Bob Johnson, president and CEO. “We believe vertically-integrated chicken production is our core competency and deserves 100% of our attention and resources.”

Since announcing this strategy in March 2013, House of Raeford expanded its chicken further processing operations by purchasing two plants—one in Mocksville, N.C., which opened in April and produces fully-cooked chicken products, and the second plant, which came with the acquisition of Filet of Chicken, an Atlanta-based producer of par-fried and IQF further processed products.

The Raeford plant currently employs about 400 associates.

“We are grateful to the employees who have worked in our Raeford, N.C., operation for their loyalty and dedication. We are committed to helping each of them during this transition,” says Johnson.