| The solution for Pacific Natural Foods, Portland, OR, was to establish its Certified to the Source program more than 10 years ago. “Our founder discovered that the conventional ways of looking at ingredient sourcing weren’t enough,” says Patrick Gabrish, director of foodservice sales, Pacific Natural Foods. “He felt that if you wanted to absolutely guarantee product to the operator and consumer, you had to first guarantee the quality of the product that you’re converting.” The company developed an exhaustive 15-page questionnaire for potential suppliers, such as organic dairy farms and chicken producers. Vendors must disclose everything about their production. “Certified to the Source is two parts,” Gabrish says. “First is an attitude about how we source, which is domestic whenever possible. The other part is the manufacturer’s disclosures. We use a minimum amount of flavors from flavor houses, which will have a lot of components that we make them source. So there aren’t many who want to work with us.” That’s one of the reasons why the company grows its own red chiles for roasting. “We were having trouble certifying those, so now we produce our own, and can totally certify that component,” Gabrish says. “We’ve discovered that the cost difference between doing cheap versus doing right isn’t much. We can push back on operations, sales and marketing, but the one thing we cannot push back on is quality assurance.” Larry Anderson’s job as director of purchasing for Wixon, Inc., St. Francis, WI, is to make sure raw materials, wherever they’re sourced in the world, are consistent in quality today and beyond. That means buying from sources that offer assurance in a variety of areas. “There’s more documentation and more detail these days, and we have to track back farther to make sure all the regulatory documents, nutritional data and specs are in place,” he says. “You better know what suppliers have in place to protect you,” Anderson continues. “If you’re meeting with a company’s representatives at a trade show and they say they have the best of something and show you a beautiful sample, go see what they’re capable of doing. We’re not afraid to travel, so we get out and visit folks. If the factory is a hole in the wall in a Third World country, it’s not a company with which you want to be doing business. So it’s important that you know who you’re dealing with, know their capabilities, and evaluate your risk.” Brent T. Frei operates Frei & Associates, a foodservice-marketing firm, in Schaumburg, IL.
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