Milk does not stop for a construction schedule, and neither do cattle, so a concrete crew working on a dairy or processing site has to build around animals and trucks that are already on the move. The agricultural economy of northern Colorado is real concrete country: feed lanes and alleys that take daily scraping, bunker walls and silage pads, wash pads, manure and wastewater containment, scale foundations and the heavy-duty aprons of the plants that receive what the farms produce. We build that work, and we know that on a working operation the best sequence is the one that interrupts animals the least.
The processing plants around Greeley show how big the buyer can be. A cheese plant there was built as an over $250 million, 883,000 sq ft facility designed to use more than 7 million pounds of milk per day at full build-out. A beef plant in the same city can slaughter roughly 6,000 cattle per day, about 5 percent of U.S. beef processing capacity. Plants of that scale pull on a surrounding network of dairies, feedlots and haulers, and every link in that network has a slab, a pad or an apron that needs to be built to take the load.
Our agricultural clients range from a single dairy replacing a feed lane to a processor expanding a receiving yard. We treat each with the same rigor: a written scope, a pour plan, a mix suited to wet and manure-rich exposure and a clear schedule for when animals can return to the area. Related industrial owners, such as industrial and manufacturing owners, will recognize the approach, but the exposure here is more corrosive and the work is paced by animals instead of a lease date.
The first step on any agricultural site is a walk with the owner to learn the daily rhythm: milking times, feed delivery, hauling, calving or shipping days. We sequence the work in bays or lanes that can be closed off without disturbing animals in adjacent pens, and we set temporary fencing and gates so cattle, equipment and the trade crews never share a path. A pour that would block the milking parlor entrance is scheduled for the hours between shifts, and concrete is pumped from a staged location so mixer trucks do not cross the yard.
Biosecurity is part of the plan. We wash equipment before entering a facility, follow the owner's rules on boots and vehicles, and avoid moving from one farm to another in the same day without cleaning. For processing plants, we follow the plant's contractor rules, including food safety and foreign material control, and we cover materials and keep rebar and tie wire out of any area where product moves.
Agriculture has been the base of this economy for a long time. Berthoud's early economy was farming, including alfalfa, sugar beets and wheat, and Severance's primary industry remains agriculture despite recent residential construction. Eaton's surrounding farmland depends on irrigation systems, and the Great Western Bike and Pedestrian Trail follows the former Great Western Railway route through Severance, a reminder that rail moved crops long before trucks did.
Water defines how and where farms build. The South Platte bounds Greeley and Evans on the south, and the Cache la Poudre River runs through north Greeley and joins the South Platte about 5 miles east of the city. Ditches and laterals cross field and pen alike. We build the headwalls, check structures and flume pads that keep that water moving, and we place farm and processing slabs with attention to the water table and to flood risk near the rivers. Our knowledge of Eaton and Severance helps us anticipate these conditions before the geotechnical report arrives.
Agricultural projects are often small in the contractor's terms but complex in the farmer's. A dairy expansion might include a new freestall barn pad, feed lane, a lagoon or basin, a pump pit and a water line, and the owner does not want to coordinate four trades. We coordinate trade partners for the earthwork, the concrete and the underground, and we manage the pour, the grading and the pipe in sequence. With basin excavation included in a coordinated scope, pond and basin excavation in our scope is built to the engineer's liner and compaction criteria, not merely dug.
The same flexibility applies to processing plants. Floors in wet process rooms are placed with a slope to drains, with embedded trench drains and curbed areas. Receiving aprons and truck courts are thick and reinforced for loaded trailers, and cold-storage floors need insulation and heating under the slab to prevent frost heave, which we coordinate with the refrigeration engineer.
Animal waste is hard on concrete. Manure, urine and silage acids attack the paste and the reinforcing, so we use a dense, low water-cement mix, proper air entrainment where freeze-thaw exposure exists, adequate cover over steel and well-sealed joints. Where the engineer specifies a coating or admixture for chemical resistance, we install it according to the manufacturer. A feed lane is cleaned by a scraper or a flush system every day, so surface texture and slope matter as much as strength.
Wastewater and runoff are regulated, and owners often have a nutrient management plan or a stormwater permit that governs what can leave the site. We build the concrete containment, settling basins and sumps to the engineer's design and do not discharge anything unplanned. Our containment pads and secondary containment experience carries over directly, and owners who also work in oil, gas and midstream operations on the same land often want a single contractor for both.
The cost of farm concrete follows volume, thickness, finish and distance. A feed lane or wash pad is a simple slab, but its area is large, and a few inches of added thickness multiplies the yardage. Rural sites are often far from a ready-mix plant, which affects truck charges and the time available to place. Short-load fees and winter heat increase cost, and we advise combining pours to fill trucks.
We also look for savings in the design. Using a wider joint spacing where the engineer allows it, grading to reduce the thickness of fill, or phasing the project so one mobilization serves several pads can bring the price down. A processor or dairy that will build over several years benefits from a master plan, with each phase priced separately but sharing a design standard, so the first pour is not obsolete when the third is placed.
Agricultural and food-processing owners often combine several of our services. Receiving and shipping yards use heavy concrete paving; plants need food and beverage processing floors and drainage; and cold-chain facilities need cold storage slabs that stay frost-free. Farm growth also brings housing, so we work with homebuilders and multifamily developers who are building new neighborhoods near Johnstown and Wellington.
In each case, the question we ask first is how the concrete will be used on an ordinary Tuesday: what rolls on it, what spills on it, how it is cleaned and how long it must last. The answers shape the mix, the thickness, the joints and the cost.
Tell us the animals, the trucks and the shutdown windows. We will return a plan that builds in bays, protects your operation and prices the concrete by the yard.
A dense, low water-cement mix with air entrainment for freeze-thaw, adequate cover over reinforcing and well-sealed joints, sometimes with a sulfate-resistant cement or a coating where the engineer calls for it. Surface texture matters too: grooves that give cattle traction but still scrape clean.
Often we can, if the work is split into bays that can be closed off. We use temporary fencing, schedule placements between milkings or feedings and keep equipment out of animal paths. For some pours, such as a new lane in the middle of a pen, the animals must be moved, and we plan that with the owner.
We excavate to the design grades, test and compact the subgrade, install the liner or compacted clay barrier as the engineer specifies and place concrete aprons where equipment enters. Inspections and testing documents go to the owner, because regulators may ask for them later.
Yes. We place sloped floors with drains, receiving aprons, equipment pads and the underground utilities for process water and sanitary service, following the plant's contractor rules for food safety. Floors are finished for the coating or hardener the owner selects.
Spring and fall avoid the hardest weather, but operations cannot always choose. We plan protection for cold pours and shade or evaporation control in hot, windy weather, and we agree with the owner on which projects can wait.