Our Team

Our Team of Food and Beverage Processing Industry Experts

From the production floor to the corporate office, our consultants possess hands-on experience in all aspects of the process manufacturing industry, including engineering, management, operations, commercialization, maintenance, product development, packaging, and regulatory compliance.

Traci Morgan
Founder & Principal, Senior Project Engineer

Traci Morgan is a distinguished Senior Project and Process Engineer with a BS in Chemical Engineering from Ohio University. She has been working in consulting engineering since 1985, with the majority of those years focused on the Food, Beverage, and related Consumer Products industries. Traci has extensive hands-on experience as a field design engineer in a broad range of manufacturing sectors, processes, and unit operations. Her industry experience includes beverage, dairy, brewery, biscuit, bread, and snack baking, meat and poultry, sauces and dressings, fresh-cut produce, consumer household products, personal care products, and nutraceuticals. Traci’s substantial project experience encompasses process and packaging development and engineering, utilities and infrastructure, control systems, equipment and plant layouts, Lean manufacturing, and troubleshooting.

Traci spent the early part of her career working for large consulting engineering firms and has an impressive history of being an integral part of numerous check-out, start-up, and commissioning efforts. She is highly knowledgeable in plant manufacturing operations, production optimization, maintenance, and sanitation and has a strong working knowledge of the Stage-Gate Product Development process. Working as a field engineer in major food manufacturing operations, Traci developed an appreciation for the importance of digging into more than just the engineering aspects of an operation. Through her comprehensive approach to projects, Traci demonstrated the innate ability to fully address and integrate all aspects of manufacturing, from concept development through the delivery of consumer products to the shelf, and from major equipment unit operations to ancillary equipment, systems, and controls. Traci recognized an opportunity to develop a more hands-on, practical, and relationship-based approach to consulting and discovered a niche for bringing together experts with the ability to address every facet of product manufacturing.

Traci's aspirations to implement a more effective way to serve manufacturing clients were realized when she founded Morgan Consultants, Inc in 1997. Morgan Consultants provides specialized engineering, management, and consulting services to manufacturing companies. As the driving force behind Morgan Consultants, she emphasizes the importance of understanding the client’s culture and fully developing the client-consultant relationship. Traci has the ability to bring people together from a wide variety of roles and backgrounds and develop proactive and synergistic teams. Traci and her team have a proven track record of success with the ability to seamlessly integrate into their client’s internal teams to guide and execute corporate strategies and initiatives.

John Naes
Director of Engineering

John is a highly experienced engineering and operations professional with over 40 years of expertise in the food industry. He holds a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of Missouri-Rolla and an MBA from Georgia State University, equipping him with both technical expertise and strategic business acumen. He started as a process engineer and received excellent training in process design, project management, troubleshooting and risk management. John’s skills encompass every facet of manufacturing, from capital planning and continuous improvement to project management and process design. He has integrated his experiences in operations, engineering, continuous improvement, and maintenance, making him a highly impactful individual able to address all issues in the food manufacturing landscape.

John’s diverse industry experience includes bakery, pasta, fresh meat and poultry, beverage, coffee, frozen meals, canned goods, sauces, and alternative proteins. John uses his background to deliver plant consolidation projects, network optimization strategies, new plant construction, maintenance redesign, and site improvement plans. His impressive background and level of experience allow him to quickly survey a project or operational issue and then provide practical solutions for project implementation.

Known for his collaborative leadership style, John excels at fostering teamwork, clear communication, and building high-performing engineering teams. His level of engagement also leads to better alignment, inclusiveness, and opportunities for situational training of team members. John’s career has been in both manufacturing facilities and corporate headquarters, giving him the ability to communicate effectively up through the senior executive level. His entrepreneurial mindset and deep commitment to customer satisfaction have been instrumental in delivering large-scale projects and process enhancements that fuel operational excellence across organizations.