LINCOLN, Mont. — Around this time last year, MTN reported that Hi-Country Snack Foods was laying off most of its employees and leaving them without pay.
The last time MTN was able to get a hold of the business was back in April when they announced they were pausing production. That’s the last time several meat suppliers heard from them too.
Watch the full report below:
“Nobody there, nobody in and out, nobody can verify anything, lights are off, numbers don’t work,” former Hi-Country employee Melissa Hollowell said.
That silence has suppliers like Charlie Hollenbeck with Cowboy Meat Company out of Forsyth concerned.
“There are a lot of things that really throw up red flags, and then after they didn’t pay, quit responding to emails and text messages,” Hollenbeck said.
Hollenbeck says what started as good business conversations with Hi-Country in 2022 has now turned into cowboy meat being owed $84,000 for 12 thousand pounds of product that they dropped off in July of last year.
“I had three years of this is the plan they are going with; we are starting to see product moving,” Hollenbeck said. “We went up to their facility; they came down to our facility, and we were trying to make that connection, but we didn’t know in the background what the bank accounts looked like.”
Hollenbeck is not alone. Other ranchers across the state who don’t want to share their names for legal reasons tell me they are also owed thousands of dollars.
“You didn’t just hurt my enterprise; you hurt the town of Lincoln, some of the other fellow processors, fellow beef cattle producers, there were a lot of people entangled in this,” Hollenbeck added.
It’s former employees too, some still waiting a year later.
“I just wish they would answer their phones, like I need my 401K released,” former employee Tami Cooper said.
Currently, the Montana Department of Labor and Industry and Citizens Alliance Bank have active cases against Hi-Country in Lewis and Clark County Court.
Since April, MTN has reached out to Hi-Country multiple times to understand the status of the operations but has not received a reply at the time of this report.
In 2019, big changes were announced when the company was sold to Travis Byerly. At that time, Hi-Country Snack Foods received a $400,000 loan from the Montana Department of Commerce to help try to keep jobs in the area.
In 2023, ownership changed again and was split with several additional owners, including Wyatt Nielson, Jeff Edwards, and Chase Myers.
Hi Country’s last social media post was made in July 2025.
“That was the big thing, like we were known outside of Lincoln, which says a lot because we are just a little dot on the map.”
We will continue to follow and provide updates as they are available.
