Frequently Asked Questions

What types of meats do you sell? We sell beef, chicken, seafood, lamb, and coming 2023 pork

Do you offer whole or half beef? We do not normally offer bulk beef options. However, we occasionally offer up 1/4s. If you are interested in bulk beef, we recommend subscribing to our email list. Our subscribers are the first to know when bulk options are available.  

Is your beef grass or grain finished? Our beef is grass fed, grain finished. To get superior taste that we all love you need fat. In order to get fat, the animal needs more than grass and hay. This is why we supplement the animal's diets with grain feeds, such as barley, corn, and oats.

Are you a butcherer? We do not have our own processing facility. All our meat is processed and packaged by a local USDA inspected processing facility. Our meat has to be processed by a federally inspected facility in order for us to ship out of state. This also ensures the meat is held to an extremely high safety standard before going to consumers. 

Is your meat hormone free? Despite common advertisements there is no such thing as "hormone free" meat. All animals produce hormones naturally, thus all meat has naturally occurring hormones. However, our meat is completely free of added hormones. Our steers used for meat consumption are never administered with any type of hormone, including growth hormones/steroids. 

Is your meat treated with antibiotics? Never. Our meat that we sell through the M Ranch brand is never treated with antibiotics, ever. On rare occasions when an animal gets sick to the point that their quality of life is inhibited, we will give that animal antibiotics, but then that animal is removed from our meat program forever. Animals given antibiotics in their lifetime are perfectly safe to eat after the standard withdrawal period - but we choose to have a clear designation for our customers that all meat sold from M Ranch is 100% free of any lifetime antibiotics.

Where is your meat store located? 306 E Pike Ave, Columbus MT 59019

What days of the week is your store open? M Ranch Meats is open Tuesday through Saturday 12-6

Is your meat frozen or thawed? Frozen. We only sell frozen meat for a couple big reasons. In order to safely ship across the country, it must be frozen, especially in the summertime. Secondly there is a lot of waste that comes with selling unfrozen meat. We would be throwing out a lot of food, so we choose to only offer frozen meat, and have no waste. Also freezing meat maintains freshness.

Do you offer shipping? Yes, we are offer shipping all of the lower 48 states. 

Do you use sustainable packaging? We strive to reduce and reuse as much of our packaging as possible. Our cardboard boxes are manufactured right here in Montana and are easily recyclable. Our box liners are manufactured in the U.S. and are also recyclable. Some orders require space fillers, so we reuse old newspaper instead of buying new packaging. The way the shipping/mailing system is set up in this country make it extremely hard/expensive to try and reuse shipping material but we are always trying to improve the way we do things.

What breed of cattle do you raise? Our primary breed is Black Angus, renowned for its quality of meat. We are experimenting with cross breeding our Black Angus cattle. Cross breeding is taking two or more different breeds of cattle and breeding them in order to achieve a combination of desirable traits, such as marbling or size of meat cuts.

What is a bull versus a steer or a cow? A bull is an intact male used for breeding purposes. A steer is a castrated male primarily used for processed beef. A cow is mature female used for breeding purposes. A heifer is a young female who has not had a calf. A calf is a male or female baby under 1 year of age.

Are your animals born on your ranch? Yes, all our cattle are born and raised on the family ranch. 

Do you sell other rancher's beef? No, our beef is single herd origin. We do not source any beef from any other ranches.