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Conagra Brands

Conagra Brands, Inc. (formerly ConAgra Foods) is an American consumer packaged goods holding company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Conagra makes and sells products under various brand names that are available in supermarkets, restaurants, and food service establishments. Based on its 2021 revenue, the company ranked 331st on the 2022 Fortune 500.

Conagra was founded in September 1919 as Nebraska Consolidated Mills (NCM) by Alva Kinney. The company was a conglomerate of four grain milling companies headquartered in Grand Island, Nebraska. The company moved its headquarters to Omaha, Nebraska, in 1922 following the purchase of Updike Mill. That year, NCM posted a profit of $175,000, its first profit since its founding.

In 1941, the company opened a mill in Decatur, Alabama. It was NCM's first plant outside of Nebraska.

After researching new uses for its flour, NCM funded the establishment of the Duncan Hines brand of cake mixes in 1951 as a way to market more flour. It sold its Duncan Hines assets to Procter & Gamble in 1956. In 1957, NCM built its first mill outside the continental United States, constructing a plant in Puerto Rico. Conagra Brands would reacquire the Duncan Hines brand in 2018 through its acquisition of Pinnacle Foods, which had bought the brand from Procter & Gamble in 1997.

NCM changed its name to ConAgra in 1971. The name is a combination of the Latin words con ("with") and agrī ("soil" or "earth"). It went public and began trading on the NYSE two years later. Losses suffered in 1974 from bad investments and commodities speculation had the company facing bankruptcy. ConAgra hired Pillsbury executive C. Michael Harper to be its chief operating officer in the fall of 1974 and tasked him with stabilizing the company.

Harper began selling what he deemed to be unnecessary buildings and plots of land owned by the company, as well as entire divisions that did not align with ConAgra's new direction as a company that primarily dealt with basic food items. By 1976, now chief executive officer Harper, sold 25 assets and reduced the company debt by $35 million. In 1981, ConAgra's gross sales topped $1 billion for the first time and Harper was named Chairman.

ConAgra acquired approximately 200 companies over a 20-year period, including Banquet Foods in 1980, Peavey in 1982, Armour and Company in 1983, Monfort in 1987, Lamb Weston in 1988, and Beatrice Foods in 1990. The acquisitions of Monfort and Beatrice made ConAgra the world's largest meatpacker and second-largest food processor, respectively. During this time, the company created the Healthy Choice label, to market a line of frozen dinners.

By the mid-1980s, ConAgra was vertically integrated across the food supply chain, selling fertilizer, tires and clothing; with companies for animal and crop harvesting, and for exporting and trading.

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