A photo by Deb Gau ADM employees including Michael West and Dale Dierks, left, shows how the various products are made from corn at the ADM plant in Marshall. ADM was in the spotlight at the Marshall Area Chamber of Commerce event earlier this week.
Marshall – He’s a major employer at Marshall. But not everyone knows what the Archer Daniels Midland plant does to the community, said Eric McPhee.
“What we found is that people in general know ADM is in town, and that’s it,” he says. said McPhee, plant manager at ADM.
This week, the ADM staff hoped to change that at their Business After Hours event in The Upper Room.
On Tuesday evening, members of the Marshall Area Chamber of Commerce were invited to meet with ADM employees and learn more about corn products made in Marshall. The ADM plant in Marshall makes products ranging from starches to sweeteners like corn syrup. McVeigh said the factory is currently undergoing expansions.
“We are expanding our starch production,” He said. “We will make what are considered industrial-grade starches and food-grade starches.”
McPhee said that industrial starch is used to make materials such as cardboard or even building materials such as wallpaper.
Area residents often think of ADM’s Marshall plant as an ethanol plant, but that’s not the main product made there, ADM employees said. In the factory, corn is processed into a variety of products such as germ, which is used to make corn oil; corn gluten meal, which is high in protein and used to make animal feed; Dry starch and corn syrup.
The mill grinds 200,000 bushels of corn a day, said Dale Dirks, feed mill supervisor at ADM in Marshall. He said corn is sourced from a 50-mile area.
The various products made at the Marshall plant are used to make candy, baked goods, beverages and even pet food, said Mandy Busaker, director of the quality control lab at ADM at Marshall.
Expansions to support more starch production at the plant began last summer.
“If you drive by the back of the factory, you can see some of the construction work that is still going on right now,” he says. McVeigh said. “The goal is to get that online, hopefully by the end of the year, or sooner.”
“We’ve added a large munitions building, we’ve added a decent amount of railroad track to load more starch. The rest, we’ve reused some of the space inside our buildings. We’re adding quite a bit of equipment and the ability to actually process more starch,” he said. McVeigh said.
He said the expansions will also add functionality to the Marshall ADM site.
McPhee said ADM has worked with the City of Marshall to help make the expansions possible. In 2024, the City of Marshall approved a business tax reduction for the project.
ADM’s expansion project was also one of eight statewide to receive grant funding from MnDOT’s Minnesota Rail Service Improvement Program in 2024. ADM was awarded $1.87 million to help construct the new loading building and rail link.
McPhee said ADM has held an after-hours business event as a way to help inform community members about what they’re doing. He said ADM is making a positive impact in the Marshall area community through employment and industry, and through giving back. “We want to help. We want people to know what we do.”
Programs like ADM Cares serve causes such as alleviating hunger and investing in education and sustainable agriculture. Recipients of ADM Cares grants in the Marshall area have included organizations such as the United Way of Southwest Minnesota and the Southwest Minnesota Private Industry Council.
“It’s been a great crowd so far,” McVeigh said of Tuesday’s event. “The weather was good, the location was great, and people were interested in seeing what we were doing.”