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O C G S h o w D a i l y 2 5 M o n d a y, Ju n e 6 , 2 0 1 6 SUMMER FANCY FOOD SHOW PROMISES DELIGHTS By Lorrie Baumann A finalist for a 2015 sofi Award for its Burnt Sugar and Fennel Shortbread, Lark Fine Foods will be back at the Summer Fancy Food Show this year with Salted Caramel Almond Chocolate Pearl short- bread cookies. This cookie starts with a traditional chocolate chip cookie and kicks the recipe up a notch with Valrhona Chocolate Pearls – little crispy nuggets enrobed in chocolate and mixed into the cookie dough along with crackly bits of salted caramel and almond brittle. "There are noticeable chunks of caramel throughout the cookie," said Lark Managing Partner Bob Carroll, who describes this as "a chocolate cookie for grownups." A 5.5-ounce package con- taining about 10 of the cookies has a sug- gested retail price of $6, and this new cookie flavor is shipping now. Lark Fine Foods is also debuting three flavors of its all-natural shortbread cookies in a single-serving size. Each 1.5-ounce package contains two cookies in either Salted Caramel Almond Chocolate Pearl, Salted Rosemary and Coconut Butter varieties. Carroll says the Salted Rosemary cookie makes a great accompaniment for cheese, and all three of the single-serve packs are positioned for sale as snack items. They're also available for immediate shipment. Manicaretti Italian Food Importers won a sofi Award in 2015 with Sicilian Pistachio Spread and has fresh victories with four gold awards at the New York International Olive Oil Competition. Manicaretti will have those oils, includ- ing Titoni DOP, an organic extra virgin olive oil from Sicily, and Crudo, a bright green oil with strong yellow undertones. "Every year it wins awards, both in the U.S. and in international competitions. It stands out in terms of profile and in terms of story. It's a very interesting olive oil," said Rossella Florio, Manicaretti's Marketing Director. "We have a very nice portfolio of oils from different regions in Italy." Manicaretti will also be bringing expansions to the gluten-free pasta line imported from Rustichella d' Abruzzo, for which Manicaretti is the exclusive importer. The new products include pasta made from buckwheat, green pea and red lentil flours. Each is gluten free and organic. "It's all about awareness and offering more options that are equally delicious as durum wheat pasta," Florio said. Missing from the Summer Fancy Food Show this year will be Boat Street Pickles and Coop's Microcreamery. Boat Street Pickles' Pickled Cherries were a finalist in the Best New Product category at the 2015 sofi Award competition, while Coop's Microcreamery's Salted Caramel Sauce was a winner in the Dessert Sauces, Toppings and Syrups category. Neither company has a new product to launch this year. Boat Street Pickles' Pickled Cherries are selling well, and Chef Renee Erickson, the company's product developer, has been very busy earning a James Beard Award at The Whale Wins in Seattle. Erickson was named the Northwest's Best Chef by the James Beard Foundation. Coop's Microcreamery has pushed product development to the back burner while preparing to move into a new 1,200 square-foot facility, says Marc Cooper, the "Coop" of Coop's Microcreamery. The new facility doubles the creamery's production space, and Cooper is hoping that his expanded capacity will help him catch up with an orders backlog. KING HENRY'S: VARIETY AND VALUE IN EVERY BAG By Trina Davidian, President and Chief Executive Officer, King Henry's, Inc. My company is King Henry's, Inc. and we have been in business since 1989. We have our own bag line named King Henry's that consists of candies, nuts, trail mixes, Hispanic items and toys. We also have a pouch bag line that is targeted for high-end gourmet stores. Our company focuses on re-bagging, co-packing and private label for almost any dry products across the United States. Many things set our company apart from our competition, one of which is that we have the highest quality, variety and value in each bag. King Henry's searches for manufacturers that have quality products that are well known and are proven to be great tasting and great selling across the world. In King Henry's bag line, we have more than 200 items to choose from and many different sized racks to fit most locations' needs. We also give the bags the most product that we can, so that the end consumer feels that they get value for their purchase. The second distinc- tion is that I have been in this business for more than 26 years, and started as a route sales person driving a truck and making deliveries store to store. I know what it is like to work long hours, work in extreme temperatures, and how hard it is to get, keep and maintain accounts. Between myself and the sales staff, we can also offer help and suggestions for distributors, from getting accounts to setting up racks, to maximizing their sales and profits per store, considering their warehouse capacity and their geo- graphical area. Another difference is that we can react to our customer's needs and requests for new and varied products much quicker by testing many dis- tributors across the United States for items that are the most popu- larly requested. This helps all distribu- tors to bring new items to the market and keeps the line constantly improving and updated to help ensure the highest level of sales possible for all distributors and stores. My name is Trina Davidian and I am writing this article to invite you to con- tact King Henry's. My sales staff and I would love to talk to you to see if we can help you, either with our King Henry's bag line, co-packing or even a private label line. GRANDYOATS: SIMPLE FOOD FROM REAL GRANOLAS By Lorrie Baumann If you happen to see Aaron Anker tooling around at the wheel of a Volkswagen bus, don't let good manners keep you from calling him a granola to his face. He won't mind. "We are who we are," he says. "We make granola, but we also drive our VW buses, and when you meet our staff, you'll know why we have all been called gra- nolas at some time in our life. We are authentic. We are who we say we are." Anker is a co-owner and Chief Granola Officer at GrandyOats, a Maine maker of organic cereals and snacks that's just finished its third straight year with more than 25 percent annual growth. Over the past year, the company achieved 28 percent growth and made 1.2 million pounds of organic granola, trail mix and roasted nuts and generated $5.3 million in sales. GrandyOats is also just settling into a state-of-the-art 100 percent solar pow- ered facility that will make the company the first net zero food production facility in New England. The new facility is located in Hiram, Maine, where it's adding 21 to the only 39 jobs currently existing in the town of Hiram. "We are literally in the mountains, in the hills of Maine, way off the beaten path.... One of the things that's happening in rural New England is that there isn't much econom- ic growth and people are migrating to the cities. A lot of these towns don't have much going on," Anker says. "We really enjoy being able to employ people. We get people who are excited to join us, who are excited to be part of the compa- ny.... We're helping the community grow. It's a really nice feeling." Anker joined the company in 2000 after co-owner and Head Honcho, Nat Peirce, a college friend from the University of New Hampshire bought the company and invited him to join the part- nership. The two have pursued their goals of creating a healthy, good place for people to work and keeping the organic integrity of their products. Their ownership of the company and a strategy of gradual growth and reinvestment in the business frees them from having to meet investor goals as well, Anker says. When GrandyOats outgrew its previ- ous facility and Anker and Peirce went looking for new premises that would allow them to fulfill a dream of powering their operations with solar energy, they were fortunate to find a disused elemen- tary school made available by consolida- tion of the local school district. The 8.5- acre site included more than an acre of space where the students used to play soccer and kickball and that's now used as the site for 288 solar panels that are expected to produce an average of 95.622 kilowatt hours of electricity annually. That's enough to offset 145,000 pounds of greenhouse gas emissions each year. "We looked at all the different options for space, including some that would have required cutting down trees, but that was- n't the granola thing to do," Anker says. "Revitalizing an old building was." Everything in the new building is powered with solar electricity, including the ovens, the forklifts, the heating and cooling. "We won't have any petroleum on premises at all," Anker says. "We're really excited about it, and we're the first food production facility in New England to do that." With its new plant, the company is ready to expand its distribution into addi- tional retailers in California, Arizona and Nevada under the leadership of a new Western U.S. Account Manager, Becky LaFord. GrandyOats is already being sold in the South Pacific region of Whole Foods, and the product line is doing well in independent natural food stores and co-ops as well as Hannaford, Wegmans and MOM's Organic Markets. All of those retailers are good partners for the brand, which does best when it's in the hands of retailers who care about the integrity of the products they sell, value transparency about how the products are made and are willing to educate cus- tomers to help them make good deci- sions, Anker says. GrandyOats is also offered in 75 col- lege and university dining halls. "It's been really a fun segment for us," Anker says. "It helps universities communicate their commitment to healthy, quality offerings they can feel good about. It's been positive for the schools, the stu- dents, and has helped grow our business and brand." The company's product line com- prises more than 40 SKUs of trail mixes, granolas, roasted nuts, and hot cereals. The Classic Granola has 11 ingredients. The trail mixes generally have seven or eight. Those ingredients don't include either refined sugars, canola oil or corn. "With our granolas, you're never going to find any refined sugar. We only sweet- en with honey, maple syrup, fruit juice and agave. We use fruits and nuts and wholesome grains," Anker says. "For instance, our Instant Oatmeal Cup: Why make something simple like oatmeal complicated? Organic oats, cranberries, raisins and apples – delicious oatmeal with 35 percent fruit. You can add what- ever milk you want, whatever sweetener you want. That's our philosophy – pure, clean food, 100 percent organic.... We make good, clean food. We don't think it needs to be overly complicated."