Iverstine Family Farms’ full-service butcher shop and smokehouse is scheduled to open at 4765 Perkins Road on Friday, Oct. 21, owner Galen Iverstine tells Daily Report.
Iverstine says the shop—called Iverstine Farms Butcher—will not immediately hold a ribbon cutting or grand opening ceremony. Instead, he intends to open and immediately start taking turkey orders in anticipation of the Thanksgiving holiday.
“Maybe a month down the line we’ll have some kind of opening celebration—maybe time it with Thanksgiving,” Iverstine says, adding that telephone and Internet lines are being installed at the shop.
Iverstine Family Farms, of Kentwood, has had a presence in the Baton Rouge area for some time now. The farm sells sustainably raised meat at the Red Stick Farmers Market in downtown Baton Rouge on Saturdays and has been selling to local restaurants since 2011.
The Iverstine family announced in March that it planned to open a butcher shop in Baton Rouge.
The butcher shop and smokehouse will occupy 1,656 square feet of the 3,766-square-foot Aldrich Market retail development. The Perkins Road development, led by real estate developer Chad Ortte, is adjacent to Glasgow Avenue near the Rouzan development. The butcher shop and smokehouse is currently the only tenant.
Iverstine says there have been no major hiccups, but the contractors did have to briefly turn their attention elsewhere due to the flood.
Once it’s up and running, Iverstine Farms Butcher will be open every day except on Mondays.
That’s because the farm is part of Slow Foods USA: Slow Meat, Iverstine says. The slow meat campaign encourages consumers to eat better meat and less meat.
“Part of what we do is not eat meat on Monday,” Iverstine says. “We are offering locally raised, humanely raised meat that’s good for the community and that’s good for the environment.”
—Alexandria Burris
