When Lifeway Foods Inc. purchased the former Golden Guernsey fluid milk plant in Waukesha, Wis., at a bankruptcy auction in 2013, it faced an uphill battle in readying it for production of the company’s signature 32-ounce kefir line. Although the 157,000-square-foot, 60-plus-year-old facility had “good bones,” its former tenant had shut down very quickly with no exit plan.
“The facility was pretty raw when we came in,” admitted Todd West, vice president of operations for Morton Grove, Ill.-based Lifeway Foods. “It took a tremendous amount of effort to get everything closed down from Golden Guernsey and start bringing in equipment to do what we needed to do to get it up and running.”