Order a steak at a local non-chain restaurant, and chances are good your entree will come courtesy of Canal Fulton Provision Inc.The 43-year-old family-owned meat processor has grown quietly from a small butcher shop to an enterprise boasting more than 900 wholesale accounts in the Cleveland-Akron-Canton area.“We’ve done it all without salesmen. It’s all word of mouth,” said Jeff Mizarek, president of the Stark County company.Late last year, Canal Fulton Provision nabbed the No. 3 spot on the Weatherhead list of Northeast Ohio’s 100 fastest-growing companies, compiled by Case Western Reserve University and the Council of Smaller Enterprises (COSE).Mizarek was surprised that his company ranked that high, above traditional chart-topping businesses, such as high tech and medical enterprise.“I really didn’t expect to make it to the top 100,” said Mizarek, who applied for the list after seeing information in a meat-processing trade journal.Since its beginning in 1969, Canal Fulton Provision has operated out of space in a nondescript shopping plaza on Locust Street (Locust becomes Portage Street east of Canal Fulton).Customers at the retail butcher shop that Canal Provision continues to operate in the plaza might not realize that behind the glass cases filled with fresh meat lies a sprawling maze of processing areas, storage rooms, coolers and freezers, as well as a smokehouse area.“We’re very deceiving from the front,” Mizarek said.The company employs 30 workers — up from about 20 as of 10 years ago.Business picking upGeorge Mizarek, Jeff Mizarek’s father, has said the business has grown by picking up market share as competing wholesalers have gone out of business, faced with increasing regulations and overhead.George Mizarek owns the company, along with Jeff and Jeff’s sister, Debbie Beardsley.An example of the increased regulations — and expenses — involves testing of beef and chicken samples for bacteria, such as E. coli.“Others couldn’t absorb the cost,” Jeff Mizarek said.The weak economy also knocked some competitors out of the business, Mizarek said.He figures about 75 percent of sales are to wholesale customers, with the company supplying fresh — never frozen — meat to about 400 restaurants in Northeast Ohio.The majority of the restaurants are locally owned; the company also serves as a backup for chain restaurants when they unexpectedly run out of meat supplied by their own commissaries.Mizarek said the wholesale business also has grown as people eat out more.“Consistency with the quality and size of cuts” has been key to the company building a loyal wholesale clientele, he said.The company keeps expenses down by buying beef and pork directly from packing houses.Team NEO reportThe company is an example of the subject of a report released today by the nonprofit economic development group Team NEO. It shows that most segments of the food manufacturing industry — including meat processing — saw significant growth in the region from 2000 to 2011, despite two recessions.Northeast Ohio’s food manufacturing output, measured in dollars adjusted for inflation, grew by 25 percent overall from 2000 to 2011, according to the report.Food manufacturing is a $2.6 billion industry in Northeast Ohio and is projected to grow almost 13 percent by 2019.Jacob Duritsky, head of business attraction for Team NEO, said the overall food manufacturing industry is growing by selling products for consumption outside the region. He noted that Northeast Ohio’s population isn’t growing much.The food manufacturing data were included in Team NEO’s report, a quarterly compilation of economic data.The report also said that the region’s overall employment — in all industries and public-sector organizations — was up almost 27,000 jobs in the fourth quarter of 2011 compared with the 2010 fourth quarter.But overall employment falls far short of pre-recession levels, with the number of jobs down nearly 90,000 from the second quarter of 2007. The recession officially began in December 2007.Team NEO tracks a Northeast Ohio region that includes Cuyahoga, Summit, Stark, Portage, Medina and Wayne counties.Team NEO serves as the area’s arm for the state’s public-private JobsOhio job creation initiative.Katie Byard can be reached at 330-996-3781 or kbyard@thebeaconjournal.com.