As part of an event to celebrate of their founder Saturday, Seltzer’s Smokehouse Meats owners officially launched a guided tour program of the well known bologna company’s Palmyra smokehouse.

Dozens came out to the company’s Palmyra outlet store on 209 North Railroad to celebrate Harvey Seltzer Day, the butcher who started the business in 1902. The event was an opportunity to share the celebration of a 122-year-old business with the community, according to Seltzer CEO and fourth generation owner Austin Wagoner.

“There’s not many businesses that make it to the fourth generation,” he said. “We are truly blessed as a family to have a product that was so unique and a customer base that was so loyal.”

Wagoner bought the business in 2019 from his maternal uncle, Craig Seltzer, who himself inherited the business from Wagoner’s grandfather, Jack Seltzer, who inherited it from Harvey Seltzer. The company produces dozens of products such as signature bologna, deli meats and beef sticks that are sold in local grocery stores.

The process of producing Seltzer’s flavor is a 24/7 endeavor, with fires being hand tended all hours of the day. Smoke master Ben Boger said the company still makes its products as their founders did in 1902, which includes wooden smokehouses and a three-day smoking process.

“We use all hard wood, mainly oak slab with a little bit of mix here and there,” he said. “But the way these houses are specifically built, and the moisture that we add with the sprinkler system on the top of the plate, that smoke right there … you’re not going to get that taste anywhere else.”

On Saturday, the company officially launched the Smokehouse Experience Program, a guided tour of the Palmyra smokehouse facility. The tours will give residents the ability to walk inside the old-fashioned wooden smoke houses and smell that smoke first hand.

“They’ll be able to see what the smokehouse is like, smell it when smokehouses are going, but also get the history of this place that a lot of people are unaware of,” Boger said.

After people who have taken these tours go home, Wagoner hopes opening a package of Seltzer’s meats immediately snaps them back to when they saw how it was produced.

“They say smell is the strongest sense tied to memory,” he said. “So our hope is that by allowing them to connect and see what this smoking process is like, when they get home (and) they open the product, it will really will take them back. So that’s the dream of it.”

In the century that Seltzer’s has been operating, the company has seen two global pandemics, two world wars, was briefly shut down during World War II because of sugar rationing, and has seen countless technological advances in the industry.

The Smokehouse Experience Program includes a tour through the company’s self-made museum that illustrates some of that history. Included among their collection is Harvey Seltzer’s school desk, ledgers from the the 1920s and former Speaker of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives Jack Seltzer’s campaign items.

The company plans to keep updating and adding to the museum as the experience moves forward, Wagoner said.

“Humans are story based people,” he said. “We love a good story. Here at Seltzer’s we have a phenomenal story, and a long, long story. So for people to come on the smokehouse experience, they’re going to get a chance to see the whole process, but also the history behind how it evolved over the years.”

The Smokehouse Experience Program tours will be running six days a week between 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Residents need to book tours at least 24 hours in advance by calling 717-798-9155 or going online at seltzersoutletstore.com/tour-guide.

People looking for more information on Selter’s Smokehouse Meats can visit their website at seltzerssmokehousemeats.com.

Matthew Toth is a reporter for the Lebanon Daily News. Reach him at mtoth@ldnews.com or on X at @DAMattToth. Douglas Stump is a correspondent for LDN.

This article originally appeared on Lebanon Daily News: Seltzer’s launches guided smokehouse tours during Harvey Seltzer Day