Three generations. One simple idea: make good stuff.
A family-run Mississippi meat shop that takes the craft seriously, and has a good time doing it.
It started in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, in 1980, when J.S. Strickland opened a small convenience store and gas station. Before long, the family added barbecue, and what started with a few grills out front grew into years of catering, cooking and feeding South Mississippi.
The next chapter came through wild game. Dustin Strickland, J.S.'s grandson, grew up around the family business working smokehouses as a kid. Over time, the game-processing side grew beyond basic processing and more toward what we're known for today: smoked sausage, snack sticks, specialty products and a willingness to try flavors that weren't exactly traditional.
By 2012, that side of the family business had grown into its own shop, Strick's Specialty Meats.
Today, the third generation of the Strickland family carries it forward, still in Hattiesburg and still figuring out what we can make next.
What started with processing deer for local hunters grew into creating sausages, jerky, snack sticks, and specialty meats with flavors people actually got excited about eating. We experimented. We listened to our customers. We made some things that sounded a little crazy. And every once in a while, one of those crazy ideas became the next customer favorite.
Along the way, those products started winning awards on the national stage. Today, Strick's products have won multiple national awards year after year, but we're even prouder that people keep coming back for them.
Where we came from
Hunting camps, pig roasts, and a rib team, long before nationwide shipping and the trophy wall.
We are still a family-run Mississippi meat shop at heart. We still process wild game. We still make sausage. We still develop new flavors in the same shop where we work every day.
Through social media, education, industry partnerships, and now nationwide shipping, we're getting the opportunity to share what we do with people far beyond South Mississippi.
We also believe the future of this industry depends on making the meat world a little more approachable, a lot more interesting, and worth passing down to the next generation. That means sharing what we know, showing what really happens behind the scenes, trying new things, and occasionally making something that probably shouldn't work...but absolutely does!
We just don't think we have to take ourselves too seriously while doing it.
After more than four decades and three generations, plenty has changed around here. But the important stuff hasn't.
Same family, same standards
Three generations later, it's still a family business. Dustin, the grandson who started working in the shop as a child and eventually built Strick's Specialty Meats, is now raising his own kids around the same shop. Ken and Trisha are still part of it too. A lot has changed since 1980, but the name on the sign is still the family behind it.
Where we belong
We stay sharp by running with the best in the business, and giving back close to home.
Awards & recognition
A few of the honors behind those national awards, earned at the counter and on the national stage.
Top national honors for our whole muscle jerky at the AAMP championships.
Dustin Strickland was invited to judge at the national cured meat championships.
Elected to help lead the American Association of Meat Processors.
Voted the best barbecue around by the folks who eat here every week.
A national magazine profile of how Strick's approaches custom game processing.
Recognized early on for our small diameter sausage against the country's best.
Training & credentials
We keep learning so your meat is handled right, from food safety to the newest processing techniques.
Eat Meat. Be Happy.