Tracy Mackness went from working in a prison butcher shop to owning her own company.
Tracy Mackness encountered her first pig nearly a decade ago while serving a 10-year sentence for a drug conviction in England’s Kent region. An inmate farming program turned her on to the rare British saddleback breed. “They’re gentle, kind pigs,” says Mackness. “I really felt a connection.” Upon her release, in 2007, she bought 30 saddlebacks with money she’d earned in the prison butcher shop.
Mackness raised the animals on a friend’s property until she was able to purchase four acres outside London. Even then, she recalls, “I had no electricity. I couldn’t afford it.” Today, the 51-year-old oversees 800 pigs and 22 employees, who help her make award-winning sausages in 60 different flavors, as well as bacon, pork chops, and ribs. It’s a far cry from doing time, an experience she chronicled in Jail Bird: The Life and Crimes of an Essex Bad Girl. “I’m often asked to speak about how I turned my life around,” says Mackness. “I tell people the pigs took over.”