Best American-Made Beef Jerky & Meat Snacks: Jerky, Meat Sticks and Summer Sausage Made in the USA

The Link family's butchering story starts in the 1880s, when Chris Link came to America with the family's sausage recipes. His great-grandson Jack Link began selling beef steaks to Wisconsin convenience stores in 1985 and opened the company's first processing plant in Minong, Wisconsin in 1986. The company is still family-owned, with Jack and his son Troy running it, and its headquarters are still in Minong.

Jack Link's FAQ says most of the products it sells in the United States and Canada are packaged at its own plants in Alpena, South Dakota; Mankato, Minnesota; Minong, Wisconsin; and New Glarus, Wisconsin. A meat-industry trade profile describes Alpena as the main plant for high-speed jerky production. The range we list covers the Original, Peppered, Teriyaki and Sweet & Hot jerky bags and the thicker beef steak strips.

The caveat is in the same FAQ. Jack Link's says it also sells products made and packaged at its own facilities in New Zealand, and it does not say which markets those go to. The listing we checked carried no country-of-origin line. Jack Link's is the most widely sold jerky on this list and most of it is Midwest-made, but if origin matters, read the package of the bag in your hand.

Old Trapper sold its first jerky in 1969 from a roadside market in Tillamook, Oregon. The company is still family owned, now headquartered in Forest Grove, west of Portland, and calls itself one of the largest meat snack makers in the country. It makes its jerky from lean top round, flavored with natural wood in its smokehouses, in Old Fashioned, Peppered, Teriyaki and Hot and Spicy, plus a variety pack. Its site carries a Made in USA label. Old Trapper does not say where its beef is raised.

Buffalo Bills jerky comes from Choo Choo R Snacks, Inc., which started in 1990 in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, about 15 miles east of Hershey, with a single hickory beef jerky. Its line now runs past 100 items, including hickory-smoked jerky pieces and 7-inch strips, Chipotle Habanero country-cut jerky and Short Shots, 3.5-inch beef sticks sold 120 to a 30-ounce bag. The company says all Buffalo Bills beef jerky is made in the USA solely with US-raised beef, which makes it one of the few here that states where the cattle came from.

Scotty's Country Smokehouse makes jerky and meat sticks at its USDA-inspected plant, operating as Glenwood Smoked Products, at 4491 N Haroldsen Drive in Idaho Falls, Idaho. Three generations have worked there, and the plant has been USDA inspected since 1983. We list its teriyaki jerky, mini pork-and-beef sticks and 9-inch sticks; their listings say "Handcrafted in Idaho." Scotty's sells mostly through farm and ranch stores, truck stops and gas stations.

Oberto started in Seattle as Oberto Sausage Company, tracing its recipes to Constantino Oberto and 1918. The founding family sold it in 2018 to Premium Brands Holdings, a Canadian specialty-foods group. Oberto's grass-fed beef stick page states: "Every Oberto grass-fed beef stick is made in one of our smokehouses in Washington." The sticks, in Original and Chipotle, are 100% grass-fed beef with no sugar. The classic Oberto jerky bags carry no origin statement, and at least one Oberto jerky, Oh Boy Oberto Thin Style Original 7 oz, is made abroad. Buy the beef sticks if US origin is the point.

Chomps was founded in Chicago in 2012 by Pete Maldonado and Rashid Ali and is now headquartered in Naples, Florida. Its FAQ says all Chomps meat sticks are produced and distributed in the US. The sticks are grass-fed and grass-finished beef with a short ingredient list, 10 grams of protein and zero sugar, in Original, Jalapeno, Sea Salt and Smoky BBQ. Chomps does not name its plant, and its brand copy says the beef comes from US and New Zealand farms, so the stick is US-made but the beef may not be.

Bridgford Foods began as Hugh H. Bridgford's San Diego meat market in 1932 and is now a Dallas-based public company. Its Chicago plant makes dry and semi-dry sausage and beef jerky, and it says its sausage sticks, salami and jerky use USA-sourced meats. We list its teriyaki sausage sticks.

Fusion Jerky founder KaiYen Mai grew up in the Bay Area in a family that had made traditional Asian jerky for nearly 50 years. In 2012 she built her own processing plant in Scottsbluff, a rural town in western Nebraska, so she could control each step, and launched Fusion Jerky in 2014 with eight flavors. The company describes Scottsbluff as a USDA manufacturing plant, and it also makes private-label jerky for other companies. The beef line includes Cracked Pepper, Original Hickory, Japanese BBQ, Sweet Beef and Chipotle Lime, and there is a pork line too. The site does not say where the beef or pork is raised.

Cloverdale Foods dates to 1915, when Hoy Russell started Mandan Creamery in Mandan, North Dakota; pork products followed a few years later, and the Tangy Summer Sausage came out in 1958. The family company is on its fourth generation. Its plant at 3015 34th St NW in Mandan opened in 1988, and a 2021 expansion added fermentation rooms. The Tangy, Cracker Size and Tangy Snackers summer sausages all come from that plant. Cloverdale processes meat but does not slaughter, and its FAQ says the pork comes from US farmers whenever possible, which is not a promise that it always does.

If you want a meat snack in single portions, Cloverdale's Tangy Snackers are mini summer sausages, individually wrapped.

Start with the cut and the cure. Whole-muscle jerky, sliced from a lean cut such as top round, is the traditional chewy strip. Old Trapper and Buffalo Bills both use top round. Meat sticks are ground and stuffed into a casing, so they are softer and more uniform, and many blend beef with pork. Summer sausage is fermented as well as smoked, which gives it its tang.

Read the nutrition panel for sugar and sodium. Teriyaki, sweet and hot, and barbecue flavors carry the most sugar; peppered and original styles usually carry the least, and Chomps and Oberto's grass-fed sticks are sold as zero sugar. Most jerky is high in sodium, so compare per ounce rather than per serving, since serving sizes differ between brands.

Know what "made in the USA" covers. For jerky it means where the meat was processed. Buffalo Bills is the clearest brand here on the cattle, saying its jerky uses only US-raised beef. Chomps says its beef comes from US and New Zealand farms, Cloverdale buys US pork whenever possible, and several others do not say. The package is the place to check.

To make jerky at home, Nesco of Two Rivers, Wisconsin, says its FD-28JX JerkyXpress dehydrator is made in the USA of global and domestic components, and its jerky seasoning is made in the USA. Nesco's line is split, though: its 18-quart roaster oven is made in China, so read the origin line on anything else from the brand. Slice lean meat thin and against the grain, and dry it until it bends and cracks without snapping.