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PRESTON'S MASTER BUTCHERS (est. 1904) - a wholesale and retail operation supplying superior quality meat and meat products to market. Our team of experienced and talented butchers prepare to precise specifications, hand crafting delicious, superior quality meat.
Preston’s Master Butchers was founded by an English butcher, Arthur Edward Preston, who came to New Zealand from Liverpool in the 1890s. Arthur worked for a local meat exporter called the Gear Meat Company before opening his own shop in Tory Street, and he enjoyed phenomenal success. He had seven shops, a smallgoods and pickle factory, a bacon factory in Blenheim, and a fleet of horse-drawn carts which sold fresh meat to residents in the Wellington suburbs. Arthur’s grandsons went on to open a purpose-built, specialist meat processing operation in Hopper Street in 1978 to supply meat to the trade as well as to the general public.
Preston’s Master Butchers branched out and first opened their factory shop at 88 Cuba Street, Palmerston North, over thirty years ago in 1984, and since opening they have been supplying top quality meats and smallgoods to discerning Manawatu meat lovers.Preston’s sells an extensive range of delicious, mouth watering meat products including beef, lamb and pork as well as a variety of game meats and corn fed and free range chicken. Their award winning selection of smallgoods includes Bratwurst, Kransky, Chorizo and fresh gourmet beef and pork sausages, as well as tasty saveloys, cheerios, chipolatas and breakfast sausages.
The retail store is located 88 Cuba Street, Palmerston North. Online butchery offering nationally.
Award winning sausages are produced locally by Master Sausage Makers in Porirua.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/small-business/106880000/palmersto...
Palmerston North butchery shuts as traditional butchers go from meat-space to cyber-space
Preston's Master Butchers, in Cuba St, will close on Monday after 33 years, but Palmerston North customers will still be able to order their meats online.
A century-old traditional butchery is following its Palmerston North customers online and shutting up shop.
The 114-year-old, family-run, Preston's Master Butchers will close its Palmerston North store, after 33 years in Cuba St, on Monday.
Preston Group general manager Hamish Preston said the family were proud of their long traditional butchery, but customers seemed to prefer online shopping with fewer customers coming into the store and more ordering online.
"It's completely against tradition. But if you always keep doing the same thing, no matter what, it won't work - we've got to change with the times, because our customers habits are changing."
Preston said online shopping had become a larger part of retail, due to its convenience, but it's only recently started to take over with butchery customers as well.
People trusted online shopping now, and they trusted well-established butcheries to maintain quality, so they didn't feel the need to come into the store and check the cuts themselves anymore, he said.
The company's other two stores, in Wellington and Porirua, would stay open, but the trend meant the Palmerston North store was no longer viable.
Preston said the Wellington store was able to balance things out with wholesale work, supplying cafes and restaurants around the Wellington area, and the shift has yet to cut into the Porirua butchery's in-store customers.
The Palmerston North branch was also not as big a part of their operation as it used to be, he said.
"At one point we had 30 staff in Palmerston North, back when we had contracts to supply the army, air force and prisons."
Palmerston North was a good central location for those contracts, but when Preston's lost the contracts to bigger national suppliers the butchery cut back on the store's staff.
Preston said the eight current employees were all offered jobs at Wellington or Porirua.
The equipment and machinery will also be redeployed to Wellington, as the company looked to consolidate all its nationwide sales and wholesale operations.
Once everything was moved out, the Cuba St building would be put up for sale, Preston said.
(Hamish Roderick Preston)