Complaint alleges that Defendants in suit repeatedly misled contract chicken growers, turning company into “de facto Ponzi scheme”
Thirteen farmers today sued the four principal executive officers behind the food startup Cooks Venture, alleging that they were manipulated, lied to and led into financial ruin by the defendant businessmen. The now-bankrupt Cooks Venture had promised to “disrupt” agriculture by rapidly scaling production and distribution of heirloom-bred, pasture-raised chickens. The complaint alleges that the defendants induced dozens of farmers across the Ozark countryside to mortgage farms and homes, acquire and prepare broiler houses, and stand by – all until the company abruptly shuttered in late 2023.
The defendant individuals – Matthew Wadiak, Blake Evans, Tim Singleton, and John Niemann – “insisted Cooks Venture was a ‘disruptive’ startup dedicated to ‘changing the chicken farming system,’ ‘raising a better bird,’ and even ‘mitigat[ing] climate change,’” today’s complaint reads. “In reality, Defendants launched and ran Cooks Venture with one overriding objective: To corner the fast-growing demand for heirloom-bred, pasture-raised chicken by flooding the market with below-cost product and driving rivals out of business — and then hogging its premium sales for themselves.”
According to the complaint, days before Thanksgiving 2023, Cooks Venture informed growers of its permanent shutdown in just ten days. At Cook’s Venture’s request and without legal authority, Arkansas officials then entered the growers’ farms under color of law, seized and euthanized hundreds of thousands of chickens with a scalding, suffocating chemical foam – leaving the piled bodies for growers to dispose of.
“I grew up in poultry farming. It was a big decision to change my career to buy back the farm with the poultry houses my dad built,” said Dustin Maybee, a plaintiff contract grower from Arkansas who was induced by the defendants to take on over $400,000 in debt. “In Cooks Venture, I thought I had the right partner and not a scammer. But if I’d known what I wish I had known about the people running Cooks Venture, I wouldn’t have signed.”
“This nation’s laws do not permit what these four men did to poultry growers in the Ozarks through the Cooks Venture scam,” said Basel Musharbash of Antimonopoly Counsel, lead counsel for the plaintiffs. “If these growers prevail in court, it will send a powerful message: you cannot make a quick buck by swindling farmers who just want to create a quality product.”
Cooks Venture’s actions – to offload substantial costs, capital requirements, and risks onto farmers under false pretenses – come as corporations across the country continue to force farmers into unfair and illegal contracts. The suit will be the first to challenge these practices after the Biden Administration’s updated regulations on the Packers & Stockyards Act.
“Holding the people behind Cooks Venture accountable in court is important, and so is reining in larger agribusiness firms that exploit poultry contract growers as a standard business practice,” said David Muraskin, Litigation Director at FarmSTAND and counsel for the plaintiffs. “In order to bring about a food system that’s better for farmers, animals, and consumers, we need to make an example of all companies that falsely claim to be doing things the right way.”
The contract grower plaintiffs are represented by Antimonopoly Counsel, FarmSTAND, the Brad Hendricks Law Firm, and TFPC. Today’s action only seeks to hold the individuals behind the Cooks Venture scam accountable (claims directly against Cooks Venture must go through bankruptcy court).