WHO REALLY MAKES evidence-graded answers
Kirkland Signature Seasoned Rotisserie Chicken Meat Confirmed
Kirkland Signature · Meat

Who makes Kirkland Signature Seasoned Rotisserie Chicken?

Manufactured by
Costco Wholesale (Lincoln Premium Poultry, Fremont, NE)
Citable fact

As of July 5, 2026, the manufacturer of Kirkland Signature Seasoned Rotisserie Chicken is Costco Wholesale (Lincoln Premium Poultry, Fremont, NE), per on-label, first-party, or executive statement evidence.

Verified July 5, 2026 ·See manufacturer history →
The common claim vs. the evidence

The common claim

What most answers say — and what the evidence supports

Top-ranking answers say Costco raises and processes its own rotisserie chickens through its Nebraska operation — true, but only partially: Lincoln Premium Poultry, the company Costco started in Fremont, Nebraska (opened 2019, ~2 million chickens a week), fulfills about 43% of rotisserie supply per The Hustle, and Costco does not publicly name who supplies the rest. Older answers stating the chickens all come from Foster Farms or Tyson are also unsupported today: the only documented third-party link is Foster Farms, via the 2013 recall of co-branded 'Kirkland Signature Foster Farms' rotisserie chickens.

The receipts

Evidence & sources

Every source is graded on the six-tier rubric and archived, so the citation holds even if the original moves or paywalls. The tier badge grades the source; the status grades our confidence in the maker.

Tier 4 NPR Costco Builds Nebraska Supply Chain For Its $5 Rotisserie Chickens Published October 22, 2018 · accessed July 5, 2026
Names the link directly: 'Lincoln Premium Poultry, the company started by Costco to build and manage the project' in Fremont, Nebraska; spokeswoman Jessica Kolterman: 'All of our barns in Nebraska and Iowa collectively will supply about 40 percent of Costco's needs.' Also documents scale: 2 million chickens per week at full capacity, against roughly 60 million rotisserie chickens Costco sold per year at the time. Deterministic upgrade path (registry corroboration, row does not name Costco/Kirkland — DECISIONS 2026-07-05): FSIS MPI row EST. P48304, 'Lincoln Premium Poultry', 1325 E. Cloverly Road, Fremont NE, grant 2019-10-23 (https://www.fsis.usda.gov/sites/default/files/media_file/documents/MPI_Directory_by_Establishment_Number.xlsx; archived https://web.archive.org/web/20250814021011/https://www.fsis.usda.gov/sites/default/files/media_file/documents/MPI_Directory_by_Establishment_Number.xlsx). A P-number read off retail packaging closes the loop to tier 3.
Tier 4 The Hustle The economics of Costco rotisserie chicken Published June 24, 2024 · accessed July 5, 2026
Post-opening confirmation with the rotisserie-specific share: 'In 2019, the company opened a $450m chicken facility in Nebraska that produces 2m chickens per week — enough to fulfill 43% of its rotisserie supply, and 33% of its raw chicken supply.' The load-bearing nuance: Costco's own operation covers less than half of rotisserie volume; the remainder comes from suppliers Costco does not publicly name.
The moat

Manufacturer history

The change log is the product. Attributions go stale — most sites never notice when a supplier switches. We date every change, keep the old source, and log it.

PeriodManufacturerWhat the record saysSource
PresentCostco Wholesale (Lincoln Premium Poultry, Fremont, NE)CurrentCurrent attribution — confirmed. See the evidence and fact sentence above.Evidence ↑
… → unknownFoster FarmsFoster Farms supplied the birds for Costco rotisserie chickens at least as of 2013, when the product label itself read 'Kirkland Signature Foster Farms' — documented in the CDC's record of the October 2013 salmonella Heidelberg recall at Costco's South San Francisco warehouse. No public source documents when the relationship began or whether it continues today; after Lincoln Premium Poultry opened in 2019 it covered roughly 43% of rotisserie supply, and Costco does not name who supplies the rest.Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ↗
People also ask

Frequently asked

Does Costco raise its own chickens for rotisserie chicken?
Partly. Costco started Lincoln Premium Poultry in Fremont, Nebraska — a vertically integrated hatchery-to-processing operation opened in 2019 — which processes about 2 million chickens a week and fulfills roughly 43% of Costco's rotisserie supply, per NPR and The Hustle. The remaining rotisserie volume comes from third-party suppliers Costco does not publicly name.
Is Costco rotisserie chicken Foster Farms?
It was, at least in part: in 2013 the label itself read 'Kirkland Signature Foster Farms,' per the CDC's record of that October's salmonella recall at Costco's South San Francisco warehouse. Today no public source documents whether Foster Farms still supplies rotisserie birds — Costco's own Lincoln Premium Poultry covers about 43% of supply, and the rest is undisclosed.
Has Costco rotisserie chicken been recalled?
Yes, once at store level: in October 2013, Costco's El Camino Real store in South San Francisco recalled more than 23,000 units of rotisserie chicken products over Salmonella Heidelberg linked to Foster Farms raw chicken, per the CDC. No FSIS recall of rotisserie chickens from the Lincoln Premium Poultry plant is on file (checked July 5, 2026).
What is Lincoln Premium Poultry?
The poultry company Costco started to build and manage its $450 million chicken complex in Fremont, Nebraska, per NPR. It holds USDA establishment number P-48304 (granted October 2019, per the FSIS establishment directory) and handles the full chain — hatchery, feed mill, contracted grower barns in Nebraska and Iowa, and processing — for Costco's rotisserie and Kirkland Signature raw chicken.

Get notified when a Kirkland manufacturer changes

Suppliers switch quietly and most sites never notice. We track the changes and log the day a maker moves — the same tracking that powers the change log.

Change-log newsletter · no spam · unsubscribe anytime.

All Meat products →  ·  Full catalog  ·  How we grade →