DILLER - The Diller Locker Company opened in November 2015, and has had a noticeable impact on the community.

That impact will be even bigger now. On Monday, the meat processing company officially opened the Diller Locker Company's Processing Division and Retail Store at 409 Commercial Street in Diller.

Jesse and Shelly Smith, the owners of Diller Locker Company, purchased the property from Chad and Courtney Lottman of C & C Processing. Chad and Shelly are brother and sister.

The purchase was finalized on Thursday, May 16.

Smith says the retail store will serve as a place where Diller Locker can readily serve its products to people in the surrounding area.

“The grocery store has been here a long time,” Smith said. “The original building was bought by Chad and Courtney Lottman. They started 25 years ago with the grocery store, and built the rest of the plant off of this. That's one thing we definitely want to keep going for the town of Diller - to have a grocery store as well as a processing plant.”

The processing plant, meanwhile, will be a sanitary environment where meat can be made ready to eat more quickly.

“What we'll make (at the processing division) is jerky and snack sticks,” Smith said, “and a lot of the retail items that are found here.”

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