Creating a loyal customer base by producing a consistent quality, high-BTU fuel pellet thanks to a steady supply of 100% pine mill residuals, Spearfish Pellet Co. (SPC) has maintained and improved the Heartland Wood Pellets home heating product since parent company Neiman Enterprises purchased the long-running pellet plant from Pope & Talbot in 2008.
The purchase was part of an adjacent ponderosa pine sawmill that’s the largest forest products operation in the greater Black Hills region of South Dakota and Wyoming. Neiman renamed the pellet plant Spearfish Pellet Co. while keeping the popular Heartland Wood Pellets brand name. The company also added a new home heating pellet brand, Black Hills Gold, and Stall Pro, a new bedding product.
The pellet operation has been in business since 1991, when Pope & Talbot created it as a way to get rid of sawmill and planer mill residuals that had few regional markets within reasonable transport distance. The pellet mill came on line during a short recession that coincided with a glut of pellets on the market, but after several years the operation’s quality pellets developed a strong customer base that remains in place today, says Everett Follette, SPC sales and marketing manager.
“We’re by far in the minority since we’ve continued to run all year,” Follette says, citing a slow pellet market due to more than a dozen new pellet producers coming on line in the past two years, currently low natural gas costs and the general economic downturn. “Pricing right now is down mainly because of oversupply—it’s almost the same as when we started with all the new mills.”