Austin Meat Company Goes National

The local protein favorite Epic is going national, providing healthy bars for several grocery stores across the nation.

The South Congress store is one of many businesses the Austin couple Taylor Collins and Katie Forrest have launched over the past few years. This one has been particularly successful, with about 30 full and part time associates working at a company that sells a line of more than 20 meat snacks, including protein bars and trail mix.

“We’ve always been entrepreneurially minded,” Collins told the Austin American-Statesman, “but when all of our mentors heard what we wanted to do next, they were like, ‘What are you doing?’”

Epic takes its product very seriously, making it marketable to health food stores like Whole Foods and Sprouts. The company sources its meats from carefully selected ranches that focus on pasture-centered lives. The grass-fed animals are pastured and fertilize the land in which they graze upon.

The meaty products are now available nationally at several stores, including H-E-B, Whole Foods Market, Natural Grocers, and Sprouts. According to Forrest, their bison cranberry flavor bar is the No. 2-selling protein bar in the country.

“We have a lot of really go products coming out in 2016,” she told the paper. “There are so many more spaces out there that we’ve identified that are stagnant and ready for something new.”

Epic is expecting to sell about 20 million products this year.

[Photo: EPIC]