(PRNewswire) Church Brothers Farms has announced the acquisition of the commodity vegetable business of Growers Express, LLC and a licensing agreement to extend the Green Giant Fresh brand to new varieties in partnership with Growers Express.
Church Brothers Farms said the acquired assets include the growing, harvesting and selling of field-packed vegetable commodities currently branded under Growers Express' Green Giant Fresh license. Growers Express retains the high growth, value-added segment of its business that includes offerings like Cauliflower Crumbles, Vegetable Noodles and Green Giant Fresh Vegetable Bowls.
"The transition of our commodity vegetable business allows us to better leverage our expertise as innovators, and marketers. It also gives us bandwidth to deliver more new products, consumer-focused innovation and value-added products to advance the business of our customers," said Jamie Strachan, CEO of Growers Express.
The Growers Express commodity sales team will transition to Church Brothers Farms before the end of the desert winter growing season. As a result, customers will receive the same service, branded product, personnel, volume and service levels throughout the transition.
Brian Church, CEO of Church Brothers Farms, stated, "We built a superior land base over the last decade, making this a great fit. Church Brothers Farms is positioned to align this new business into an existing vertically integrated program, which helps make the shift in business a seamless change for Growers Express customers in terms of the consistency of the field-packed vegetable product line."
The transaction is expected to expand Church Brothers Farms' overall annual production by 15 to 20 percent.
Church Brothers Farms is a vertically-integrated, family owned and operated company that produces a full line of fresh vegetables year-round with an in-house farming/harvest program and state-of-the-art processing plant, True Leaf Farms. Growers Express is a farmer-owned company focused on developing fresh, value added vegetable products. Growers Express is the primary licensed partner of Green Giant Fresh, the exclusive fresh produce arm of the Green Giant brand.
