A History of Double Digit Growth

BoniPak Produce Company

When BoniPak Produce Company began doing business in the fresh-cut produce industry in February 1998, management recognized it would be a major challenge competing against large, well-established processors already firmly entrenched and commanding dominant market shares.

BoniPak Produce is a well-established name in produce circles but traces its roots to Betteravia Farms, Santa Maria, Calif., owned by a group of six: Milo and Patrick Ferini and Henri Ardantz, senior partners, and Mitch Ardantz, Rob Ferini and Craig Reade, junior partners. The three junior partners represent the third generation of a family business that traces its roots to the 1930s when Milo Ferini, Sr., and Nick Ardantz began farming together.

The fresh-cut arm of BoniPak Produce is BoniFresh Ready Cut Vegetables.

Challenging Start
Is being a “Johnny come lately” in the fresh-cut produce industry a challenge? “Absolutely,” admits Mitch Ardantz, vice president of sales and marketing for BoniPak and general manager of BoniFresh. “It has, and continues to be, a huge challenge.”

While Ardantz is encouraged and proud of the phenomenal growth in BoniPak’s fresh-cut side of the business-double digit every year since its beginning-he is well aware of serious competition in the industry for market share. The owners recently brought in one new outside professional to help with sales in the Midwest and eastern part of the United States.

“This person will be helping us with whole produce at the retail level and value-added vegetables on the foodservice side,” Ardantz explains. “In addition, we have promoted another individual within the company to help sell nationwide, although most of his focus well be in the western U.S. Our goal is to gain more exposure for both our whole and value-added products.”

While there are challenges in all family-type businesses, Ardantz is proud of how this third-generation family enterprise continues to pull together. “As a family, we are rock solid, on the same page and are moving in the same direction,” he smiles. “We’re very proud of that, especially in today’s challenging business environment. There isn’t a day that goes by that you won’t see at least one of the senior partners here somewhere. All are still very much active in this business, and that’s a huge benefit for the third-generation management team.”

Success with Cilantro
Today, the BoniPak’s fresh-cut side of the business produces a variety of value-added products primarily for foodservice. These include a smorgasbord of pre-cut products made from cauliflower, carrots, celery, onion, salad items, cabbage, florets, spinach, parsley and cilantro. Core salad items and florets account for the bulk of the orders.

Currently, the sales department is heavily promoting fresh, washed cilantro.

“We’ve done exceptionally well with this product, both from a production and processing standpoint,” Ardantz notes. “Our marketing campaign is helping us open doors at both the retail and foodservice levels.

The fresh-cut side of the business began in February of 1998 with the purchase of a small, existing processing facility owned by a Santa Maria restaurateur. He had been operating the plant as a way to meet the value-added produce needs of his restaurants.
“He wasn’t a produce person; he was a restaurateur,” Ardantz smiles. “By and by, he decided that processing wasn’t his core competency. And since we had been buying a few items from him to supplement various orders from across the country, he approached us and asked if we would be interested in looking into the business and, possibly, buying him out.”

The invitation was accepted; the partners liked what they saw and eventually purchased the business. The venture was seen as an added market outlet for Betteravia Farms, which has extensive farming operations in California’s Santa Maria and Huron areas. More recently, additional acreage has been added in Yuma, Ariz. Total crop acreage exceeds 12,000, all prime production ground for high quality crops of lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, celery, leafy items (red, green, butter, romaine) and a variety of Oriental vegetables, including bock choi, napa cabbage and snow peas.

“From the beginning, we recognized we were not getting into a business that was in its infancy,” Ardantz admits. “But while we were late comers in this area of the produce world, we also knew that our fresh-cut produce side could, and would, become a very integral art of our vertical integration. It provided us with another outlet for our raw product.”

Today, approximately 90 percent of all produce processed through the fresh-cut plant can be traced to Betteravia Farms. That’s also good news for Bonipak Produce, which handles the farm’s cold storage and distribution side of the business. It allows the packer/shipper to widen the number of items offered to its customer base.

With a sales force already in place, there was no need to hire a new sales team to handle value-added products, Ardantz points out. In fact, the company’s established brand equity has helped open many doors.

Bonipak products are distributed all over the U.S. and parts of the Pacific Rim. Most value-added products are marketed in the U.S. but limited supplies are shipped overseas, primarily to test potential markets.

Occasional Reminder
While Betteravia Farms provides a ready supply of produce, BoniPak’s fresh-cut arm takes nothing for granted.

“Occasionally, I like to remind our plant manager that even though our value-added facility is a subsidiary of Betteravia/BoniPak, we are our own animal,” Ardantz says. “We manage our own destiny. It is important to recognize that we need to stand on our own when it comes to returning a profit. Occasionally, we may have to look elsewhere for supplies. Betteravia is not immune from Mother Nature. If for some reason Betteravia is unable to meet our produce quality needs-which is extremely rare-we have to keep our minds open. It is important that we not get into too much of a comfort zone. We do buy from others on occasion.”

Closely monitoring its food safety practices is critically important to management, Ardantz stresses. Quality HACCP, GAP and third-party audits are all in place. Primus handles the third-party audits on the partners’ farming, cooling, distribution and processing operations. From planting to harvest to packaging, all cut vegetables undergo the same rigid Bonipak standards for quality, freshness and food safety.

© 2004 Columbia Publishing