Food Plant Sanitation

Michael Cramer is a native of New York State. He started his food career at a turkey processing facility in eastern Pennsylvania while attending West Chester University in West Chester, PA. following graduation in May, 1977 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Health Education, Cramer went back to work in the turkey plant through the remainder of the processing season. He was hired by Swift & Company as Quality Assurance Manager at the facility in April, 1978. In 1979 he was transferred to a larger facility in North Carolina where he gained experience in turkey breeding, feed mill and hatchery operations and further processing. Michael transferred to Swift & Company corporate headquarters in Illinois in 1984 where he held positions as a Production Specialist and Documentation Manager. In the position as Documentation Manager he helped develop ingredient specifications, product manufacturing documents and managed the regulatory process for USDA label submission. He transferred to the Swift-Eckrich plant in downtown Chicago as plant QA Manager in 1989 where he spent two years working with cooked sausages and hotdogs. He returned to the corporate office in Downers Grove, IL in 1991 as QA Director for the Armour food plants of the newly formed Armour Swift-Eckrich. Here he implemented food safety and quality programs for cooked Ready To Eat meat and poultry products, dry and semi-dry sausage and cooked meat and poultry patties.

Michael has been a member of the International Association for Food Protection, and was part of the FSQA team at Ajinomoto Foods that won the prestigious Black Pear Award in 2020. He is also on the editorial board of Food Safety Magazine and has written articles for Food Safety Magazine dealing with Listeria control, Biosecurity, Sanitation and Sanitary Design and Allergens. He was a contributing member of the American Frozen Foods Institute Listeria Working Group. In addition, he has participated in three Food Safety Matters podcasts, conducted two food sanitation webinars and has been a presenter at numerous food safety and quality conferences.