I have taken deer to the locker to be processed and paid the big bucks, too. When the meat locker makes deer sausage, I think that they do it all at once, they don't do Joe's with Joe's deer meat then go to Sam's deer meat for Sam. I think you just get somebody's meat according to how much your deer weighed. Thats OK, I guess, if everybody is careful with the deer before it gets to the locker. I would rather do my own. This year, it got into the 70's when I tagged a small doe and I was five hours from home so I gave it to an old guy that wasn't hunting and wanted some deer meat. If it was a large deer, I would have considered taking it to the locker in the area and had it done just to keep it from spoiling. I am not sure how long a deer carcass will keep with bags of ice in it. I guess the best bet would be to take coolers along and cut the deer up and put the meat in coolers with ice, it would keep that way for several days as long as you kept replacing the ice.