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Butcher shops in Butte report strong Christmas sales

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Posted at 1:16 PM, Dec 23, 2022
and last updated 2022-12-23 15:16:22-05

BUTTE - It’s Christmas time in Butte and despite the really cold weather and inflation, people are splurging for a good Christmas dinner.

“Forty below zero I left the house this morning to come get it,” said Yvonne Frick.

Frick traveled all the way from Jackson to Butte to pick up her Christmas prime rib at Western Meat Block.

The local butcher is reporting plenty of business this holiday season.

“Crazy busy, in about an hour you’re going to see double lines here, they’ll out to the door,” said Western Meat Block founder Betty Carpenter.

Local butchers say increased food costs have not hurt business, and in some cases costs have come down.

“Actually, prime rib actually went down almost $2 a pound from last year. We were thinking they were going to go up $2 or $3 a pound, instead, they went down,” said Carpenter.

Excelsior Meats on Butte’s upper westside also reported solid Christmas sales.

“And inflation, I think it’s one of those things when people plan on splurging a little bit and we were really lucky here at Excelsior that we have a little better control of our costs because we’re using mostly local animals,” said Mac Anderson.

The cold weather caused some customers to change the day they pick up their orders.

The workers at Western Meat Block will be in business until the afternoon of Christmas Eve.

“I’ve always said that we’re Santa’s last stop. I do feel like we're like Santa’s toy shop, but we’re Santa’s food shop and we got all our mini crews and all our set of elves in each department are very, very busy,” said Carpenter.