ABOUT H&N NORTH AMERICA

OVER 75 YEARS YOUNG

Our story begins in 1945

THE BEGINNING

H&N’s origins date back to 1945 when Arthur “Art” Heisdorf bought a farm in Kirkland, Washington and started his breeding program. Two years later Art partnered with Cliff and Bert Nelson and began distributing H&N stock throughout the United States.

Art is credited with being the first to use Reciprocal Recurrent Selection “RRS” instead of crossing inbred lines. He started selling the crossed lines, which led to the creation of franchised distribution hatcheries and the selling of parent stock instead of purebred lines, the model currently used by primary breeding companies. The Nick Chick was very successful nationwide and in particular on the West Coast where it was sold by H&N directly. From 1950 H&N expanded into international markets and built its own distribution network in Scotland and Ireland, and later in Germany in partnership with Johmann and Co.

In 1971 H&N Inc. was sold to Pfizer, and in 1987 to Lohmann-Wesjohann, and in 1997 the breeding program was moved to Cuxhaven, Germany. All operations in Washington were discontinued.

Arthur “Art” Heisdorf

A PERFECT PARTNERSHIP IN PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION

Having a production and distribution agreement with Hy-Line North America gives H&N North America the ability to deliver day-old- chicks to all regions of the North American market, and grants access to a comprehensive network of parent-stock farms, hatcheries and chick delivery vehicles that enable efficient and reliable nationwide supply of large chick orders, in order to meet the demand of increasingly large complexes.

SERVICE IS OUR FOCUS

Technical service is one of the main pillars of success of H&N worldwide, and the North American market is no exception. The sales team is comprised of well-established poultry experts with extensive experience in different aspects of the layer business. In addition, H&N North America has access to services of the technical team of H&N International, which include geneticists, nutritionists, veterinarians and experts in cage-free management, some of which lived through the housing system transition in Europe, and have learned after helping cage manufacturers to improve their systems.

HANDS-ON EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE

In addition, customers of H&N-NA are offered the opportunity to participate in a week-long technical course, the H&N Academy held in Cuxhaven, Germany hosted by H&N International, which focuses on current technical topics through a series of presentations given by experts in the discipline, including relevant field visits. The academy is a platform that allows for interaction of attendees from all over the world, encouraging the exchange of ideas and learning from other’s experiences. H&N International also hosts a hatchery academy that focuses on hatchery related issues, and is attended by the staff of H&N distributors.