As Quebec’s population and agri-food industry grew in the 1960s, the Coutures knew they needed to relocate the plant. Additional volume over the years created tension in the existing neighborhood due to increased truck traffic and insufficient air treatment capacity. Building a new plant outside Quebec City would also put the renderer closer to raw material sources. After months of searching, a large wooded piece of property on the banks of the Chaudière River near the small town of Charny proved ideal. Construction on the batch cooker plant began in 1965 and was fully operational by 1967, although administrative offices and the feed mill remained in Quebec City. Shortly after opening the new facility, the company began buying collection routes from smaller independent operators in neighboring regions, increasing its raw material supply by about 10 percent each year. This growth led to the plant reaching its maximum operating capacity after only five years. So in 1972, the Charny plant was expanded to include new Dupps continuous cooking equipment to handle the extra material. A second line was added soon after the acquisition of rendering company Recuperation Gentilly. Once fully operational, the plant doubled its production capacity in just a few years, an investment that would pay off during the second half of the 1970s as Alex Couture, Inc. began another period of expansion, including processing chicken feathers. In 1976, Alex died at home following a short battle with colon cancer. Throughout his illness, Alex remained at the center of the decision-making process. His death, however, marked the end of an era and signaled a turning point in the company’s history. A Change of Course In the months following Alex’s death, the company sold Moulee Citadelle and its poultry farms, both decisions Alex had previously consented to prior Murray Couture Sr. (center) is flanked by the third generation of renderers, his sons Martin (left) and André, at an NRA convention sometime in the 1980s. to his death. At the same time, the company’s administrative offices were moved to the Charny property and Alex Couture, Inc. chose to focus exclusively on rendering. With the sale of Moulee Citadelle, a quandary arose with Jean Couture, who had sole responsibility for the feed mill and was the second shareholder of the family business along with his brother Murray. Realizing Murray’s 25 years of experience in rendering and his strong network of contacts with NRA and throughout the industry, the situation caused no rivalry between the two brothers and Jean decided to sell his shares to Murray in 1980. It was also around this time that Murray’s five children – Murray Jr., Hélène, André, Julie, and Martin – began contributing to the company’s development, beginning with Murray Jr., the oldest son, in 1978. After Murray Jr. established Continued on page 22 family and provided financial assistance to Déziel’s family over the years, such as paying for butcher shop bills and providing regular sums of money that allowed some of Déziel’s sons to continue their education. In the post-war years, the Canadian rendering industry expanded considerably due to the industrialization of Quebec’s agri-food sector. Although there still was not much demand for protein meal, Couture decided to extend his business by producing concentrate as an ingredient for animal feeds. In the 1950s, he set up a subsidiary, Moulee Citadelle, built a mill behind the rendering plant, and hired an animal nutrition specialist. At one point, despite having no farming background, Couture established an experimental farm that at its peak had two 30,000-unit hen houses and a piggery, complete with a maternity unit. The farm was an outlet for Moulee Citadelle’s production and highlighted the quality of the mill’s product for potential purchasers. Thanks to a successful rendering business, Couture was able to send his sons Murray and Jean to study at Loyola College in Montreal, one of the best university-level institutions in Quebec. Murray studied business administration and joined the family business after completing his studies in 1953 at the age of 21, sooner than expected after his father nearly broke his neck in a horse riding accident and almost died. At the time, the company operated five collection routes in Quebec City, three using horse-drawn carts and two using trucks. Alex Couture, Inc. processed roughly 2,000 metric tons of raw material per year. In 1989, when the company celebrated its 50th anniversary, it processed around 400,000 metric tons of raw material annually and operated a fleet of 160 trailers and 115 vehicles that traveled the equivalent of 200 times around the Earth each year. Today, the renderer processes about 1.3 million metric tons of raw material per year. Jean joined the family firm a year after his brother and under their father’s guidance, each brother moved to a specific sector of the company: Murray looked after rendering while Jean concentrated on the mill division, which was in its first years of production. In 1956, Murray attended his first convention of the National Renderers Association (NRA), the voice of the North American rendering industry. By the end of the 1950s, the volume of tallow produced by the plant was large enough for Alex Couture, Inc. to envision the new challenge of exporting its products since the Port of Quebec offered direct routes to European markets. The renderer’s first tallow export went for the manufacture of soap and sailed under the Norwegian flag on a Stolt-Nielsen tanker, which was also the shipping company’s first trans-Atlantic route. Over the next 20 years, Alex Couture, Inc. averaged three or four shipments of tallow per year to the port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands for the olechemical industry. www.rendermagazine.com Render April 2014 21
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