Bob Adrian, owner of Rump’s Butcher Shoppe in Altoona, is an advocate of going local. “If we can continue to spread the word about the benefits of buying, producing, and selling locally, the positive impact on the Chippewa Valley will continue to grow,” Adrian says.
Rump’s offers a full selection of fresh meats, cheeses, and made-in-house sausage, ham, and bacon along with wild game processing. Meat and cheese trays, beer, wine, liquor, and the list goes on! They make over two hundred items in house.
Adrian says the exceptional team consists of chefs, meat cutters, caterers, and professional sausage makers. The result: extremely high quality products along with unmatched customer service. Adrian said if he had not met Dan Horlacher, the shoppe would have never happened. Both of them come from deer-processing, sausage-making families, and with a combined forty-plus years in the meat and food industry, it was an easy decision to go ahead with the shoppe after just a few conversations. As they say, the rest is history.
Rump’s Butcher Shoppe buys local beef from Elk Mound, chicken and eggs from Chippewa Falls, local buffalo and elk, and occasionally local pork as well. Adrian says they do their best to have as much local product as possible and still be able to be an affordable market.
Not long after opening Rump’s Butcher Shoppe, another opportunity presented itself. The restaurant at the Chippewa Valley Regional Airport had been sitting vacant for approximately one year. As with Rump’s, Adrian knew he had to surround himself with skilled quality partners. After some back and forth and some recommendations from friends and colleges, Adrian partnered up with Ryan Anderson and Chef Travis Dudley to start planning the new Hangar 54 Grill, which opened in May 2016 and has been very well received by the locals and airport travelers alike. There is a great partnership between the restaurant and the butcher shoppe. Quality and customer service is what both are about.
Bob, Rump’s, and Hangar 54 Grill enthusiastically support the Local Challenge. “I’ve always stood behind local business whenever possible. It just makes sense. Most of the money spent locally will keep getting recycled locally, which benefits everyone in the area. So anything I can do to help spread that philosophy is something I’m going to try to get behind,” Adrian explains.