Klement’s Sausage Factory Sold For $13 Million
No one is in danger of running out of Klement's, but building keeps changing hands.
Site of Klement’s Sausage Factory, 2650 S. Chase Ave., Photo taken April 17, 2023 by Sophie Bolich.
The Klement Sausage Co. has a new landlord.
An affiliate of Fox Point-based General Capital Group purchased the 15.4-acre manufacturing complex, 2650 S. Chase Ave., for $13 million on Sept. 2, according to state real estate records.
The approximately 150,000-square-foot facility remains Klement’s production plant, and the company has a lease on the Bay View property that runs through 2036.
Klement’s sold the complex in 2021 for $12.2 million as part of a sale-leaseback agreement. An affiliate of Madison-based SARA Investment Real Estate acquired the property and was the seller in the latest transaction.
Klement’s consolidated its production operations at the Chase Avenue plant during the past decade.
The sausage maker launched a $7.5 million expansion of the facility in 2018 and subsequently listed its original factory, 207 E. Lincoln Ave., for sale. The company closed its outlet store inside the Chase Avenue plant in April 2023, saying it needed the space to accommodate manufacturing demands.
The ownership of Klement’s itself has also changed twice in the past 12 years.
The Klement family sold the company in 2014 to Tall Tree Foods, a portfolio company of California private equity firm Altamont Capital Partners. Chicago-based Amylu Foods acquired Klement’s in 2024 for an undisclosed price.
At the time of the latest corporate sale, Amylu said it would retain Klement’s approximately 300 employees and planned to add about 200 workers during the following two to three years. The company also said it anticipated investing approximately $10 million in the Chase Avenue factory and believed new equipment could quadruple the plant’s production capacity.
Amylu specializes in fully cooked chicken products, including sausages and burgers. Klement’s produces bratwursts, hot dogs, summer sausages, snack sticks and other meat products.
Klement’s maintains its corporate headquarters in The Tannery office complex, 700 W. Virginia St., in Walker’s Point.
The sausage company was founded in 1956 when brothers John, George and Ronald Klement purchased Badger Sausage Co. and its Lincoln Avenue factory. The Chase Avenue plant was added in 1988.
Klement’s sold the original factory and several adjoining properties to Caledonia-based Hintz Holdings in 2023. The nearly three-acre assemblage included the approximately 98,725-square-foot former factory, a parking lot and three houses on S. Austin Street.
A portion of that property is now slated for redevelopment. The Common Council approved a $2.1 million city subsidy in July for Austin Commons, a proposed 100-unit affordable apartment building that would replace the three vacant houses. Northernstar Companies and The Commonwealth Companies are pursuing the $33.4 million development.
General Capital already has at least one major investment near the Chase Avenue plant. In 2010, the real estate firm developed the 60-unit Hide House Lofts, 2615 S. Greeley St., on the opposite side of the Canadian Pacific Kansas City railroad tracks that form the eastern border of the Klement’s property.
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