Experience and New Generations Combine for Great Service at Philadelphia Wholesale Produce Market

PWPM’s merchants meld advancements in facilities, technology and younger staff to best serve customers.

For over a century, Philadelphia’s produce wholesalers have been providing more than just produce to customers — they’ve also been focused on providing service.

“Across the board, in any sort of business, service is crucial,” says Richard “R.J.” Durante, co-owner of Nardella. “Excellent service continues to build trust and long-term relationships. It’s how my grandfather did it; it’s how my father did it; and it’s how I do it.”

Service is what produce industry members do for a living, agrees Rick Feighery, vice president of sales for Procacci Brothers Sales Corporation. “We live in the produce business with a focus on service,” he says. “It starts with being informed about the product, on the quality, knowing what the customers want and saving them time and effort.”

Philadelphia’s state-of-the-art produce market, built 13 years ago, houses 18 wholesale businesses.

“The Philadelphia Wholesale Produce Market (PWPM) offers outstanding service as North America’s most advanced, fully enclosed, fully refrigerated produce facility,” says Mark Smith, PWPM general manager. “We are perfectly situated to allow our merchants to source right from the port of Philadelphia (Philaport), and we’re close to railways, highways, and the airport. Our merchants have spent decades honing relationships with growers from around the world to bring variety and quality produce to the Philadelphia region.”

Tom Kovacevich, president of TMK Produce, explains the importance of listening to customers. “We focus on what our customers are looking for, and we work very hard to get the right product to the right customer,” he says.

In a tough business environment, customers are differentiating what wholesalers can offer. “The service we provide separates us from our competitors,” says Todd Penza, salesman at Pinto Brothers. “Customers want on-time delivery, specific case counts, and certain sizes. Being able to service customers quickly and give them the right product they’re looking for is crucial.”

As a retail chain with its own distribution center, Redner’s Fresh Markets in Reading PA, operating 44 stores, can bring in a lot of higher tonnage product on a direct basis. However, Jim Hickey, Redner’s senior buyer, relates this doesn’t alleviate their need for PWPM.

“Today’s world presents us with a vast array of items in a produce department,” Hickey says. “Having essentially a globally sourced inventory, we quite often rely on vendor/partners from the Philly Market who can better manage some commodities and get the necessary ‘turns’ to ensure freshness.”

Sangillo’s Farm Fresh Produce in Drexel Hill, PA, uses PWPM for most of its produce sourcing. “I find them very reliable, very efficient and their prices are very good,” says Tom Sangillo, president and owner.

The market is a great resource for Baldor Specialty Foods in Philadelphia, PA. “We utilize the Philly Market for our Philly warehouse and also for our New York facility,” says Glenn Messinger, senior sales executive. “Philly is a good market with great product and vendors. If we have a direct truck that’s delayed or arrives below quality, we can get orders filled, and we can take advantage of opportunity buys. In the summer, we also have access to a lot of local produce through the Philly Market.”

KNOWLEDGE AND EXPERTISE

The best service is built on a foundation of experience. “It takes a seasoned sales staff to know all the information about all the products and seasons, and be able to explain to buyers what they’re buying,” says George Binck, Procacci’s chief operating officer. “The knowledge base is crucial.”

M. Levin and Company has been in the wholesale produce distribution business for 118 years, and one of the services it offers customers is knowledge of the industry, according to Tracie Levin, controller. “We have many produce experts working with us, some of whom have been with us for 40 to 50 years.”

Redner’s has been a patron of the market for as long as it’s been in existence. “Our founder Earl Redner would walk the old Galloway market 50 years ago when we only had a handful of stores,” says Hickey. “I walked the market sometimes twice a week for almost 20 years. Lifetime friendships were formed that made for a complete understanding, from us as buyers and them as providers, in building business relationships that worked for all of us. Their patience, time, experience and dedication are all services going well beyond the scope of what one might expect.”

Durante explains the importance of adapting and interpreting what customers need. “It comes down to understanding and communicating sizing, seasonality, availability, pricing,” he says. “A lot of customers benefit from this because, unless you’ve grown up in this business, you don’t have that advantage.”

Information is huge when you can use it to your advantage, says Phil Bartocci, president of Coosemans Philadelphia. “Produce is a commodity, and every day the markets are changing,” he says. “Our job is to stay ahead of it. When we do a great job, we’re communicating to our customers and they’re prepared. There shouldn’t be any surprises for customers.”

“Produce is a commodity, and every day the markets are changing. Our job is to stay ahead of it.”
— Phil Bartocci, Coosemans Philadelphia

The more information customers have, the better they can do, adds John DiFeliciantonio, co-owner of North American Produce Company (NAPCO). “They can adjust their business or orders depending on what is happening in the market. We keep customers updated on crop conditions, quality, availability, timing, and give them advance ideas on pricing as best we can.”

There is a wealth of knowledge available if you simply ask the right people, adds Redner’s Hickey. “Produce can be very complicated in so many ways, and there are people on the market who have micromanaged certain commodities for years,” he says. “They can also be an excellent resource for intelligence in regard to market dynamics.”

BEYOND PRODUCT SALES

With wholesalers moving to offer more logistics and warehousing services, PWPM’s 686,000-square-foot facility is a perfect stage.

“We have ample space for incoming and outgoing produce, and we take pride in exceptional sanitation, security, and our program to rescue produce and divert it from the landfill,” says Smith. “PWPM’s cold chain is preserved by 224-sealed dock doors that surround the building’s perimeter, allowing the market’s entire loading dock and sales floor to be kept at 50 degrees F.”

Services include cross-docking, repacking, consolidation and specialty ordering in addition to others.

“Forward distribution for shippers out west is particularly valuable,” says Procacci’s Feighery. “We deliver to customers on a daily basis, from 10 to 500 pieces. A lot of the logistics aspects are quite specialized, from getting product off the piers to ripening.”

While TMK offers a wide variety of logistics services, Kovacevich considers its TMK-Local a major differentiator. “This is our DSD (direct store delivery) program for local crops,” he says. “Daily, we pick up watermelons, corn, tomatoes, blueberries, peaches and much more from our extensive network of local farms and deliver directly to the retailer. This is a win for everyone, especially the consumer who gets the freshest top-quality local produce.”

JVI developed its services based on talking to customers about their needs. “Repacking, cross-docking, delivery, and ripening were all activities we began somewhat begrudgingly at the request of a customer,” says Daniel Vena, JVI director of sales. “We first started our repack department as an extension of our foodservice business, offering fresh herbs packed to order. Over time, customers just kept adding items. Now those products and services are all an integral part of our business.”

Off the market, Procacci does a lot of repack. “The repack business at our Nanco Cold Storage facility is seeing more demand, particularly with product coming into the port of Philadelphia due to transit time on the water,” says Feighery. “It’s not just quality, it’s also labeling, bagging, and other special requests.”

Baldor’s 100,000-square-foot warehouse is within an easy drive of the PWPM and ports. “Our close proximity to PWPM helps us and our shippers with delivery,” says Messinger. “If shippers are coming to PWPM, it’s easy for them to deliver to Baldor Philly, as well. If we need something from PWPM, it’s easy for us to get there. We also take advantage of partnerships for some services. For example, we partner with JVI for ripening avocados.”

Several PWPM merchants offer custom-ripening services for their customers, explains Smith, and have outfitted their units to condition avocados, bananas, mangos, plantains, pears, tomatoes and papayas.

Ripening remains an integral value-added service for M. Levin, providing customized ripening programs for bananas and plantains. “It’s what we are best known for in the industry, and we pride ourselves on the job we do in this sector,” says Levin.

SOMETHING SPECIAL

Special orders and sourcing difficult items is another service at which Philly wholesalers excel. “We are primarily a specialty house, so we are trying to make sure our customers have all the unique and different items they can’t get elsewhere,” says Coosemans’ Bartocci.

JVI’s many contacts in the industry affords it the opportunity to reach out to multiple sources to find hard-to-get items for customers, explains Kelsey Rose, sales team leader. “When people reach out for a special product, there is a great chance someone at JVI has already done the digging previously and gives us a good base to begin searching for present day,” she says.

Nardella receives diverse requests about unique items. “There are times when we’ll be offered something for the first time,” says Durante. “We started with the Golden Select pineapples from Dole a few years ago, and they became a hit. It started as a special-order deal, and now it’s become a mainstay.”

Baldor has a reputation for being able to provide items not commonly carried by others. “Our restaurants come to us for our expertise in being able to get things they can’t. We’ve also expanded our organics line, which has been well received for its flexibility,” says Messinger.

Delivery has become another indispensable service. Pinto Bros. offers delivery capabilities via sister company A. Penza Inc. “We operate a fleet of refrigerated trucks for delivery within the tri-state area,” says Penza. “Back-hauling, forward distribution and full distribution are other options we have, and we’ve expanded to deliveries for smaller customer needs.”

More and more of the business is moving to delivery, explains Procacci’s Binck. “Even customers walking the market want us to consolidate and deliver. Transportation is a huge expense, so if they can have us do it, hopefully it benefits them,” he says.

Coosemans operates its own delivery. “There is a lot of value for our customer if we provide delivery,” says Bartocci. He says they operate six trucks to deliver to customers in the Northeast and Atlantic markets.

ENSURING QUALITY AND SAFETY

Safeguarding quality and food safety for shippers and customers is an essential service of the market wholesaler. “The wholesaler is especially important these days for consistent volume of quality product delivered daily,” says John Collotti, director of operations and purchasing at Collotti and Sons. “Our sales team is always available, and our selectors do a great job with product.”

A business is only as good as its product, asserts Bartocci. “We have a lot of high-end customers, so we are always combing through all our product,” he says. “We want to be sure when we deliver, the product is up to their standards.”

Durante explains Nardella’s warehousing facility complies with the highest quality control and food safety. “Our customers know our product has gone through strict quality control,” he says.

Food safety protocols and processes have been a contributing factor to JVI’s success in recent years, according to John Vena. “Many customers demand some sort of audited certification, and we have chosen to do SQF,” he says. “That’s really just the starting point. Besides being compliant with the customer requests, this process has made us a better company, differentiates us from our competition and provides more value to our customers.”

Pinto Bros. has maintained food safety certifications for many years and is now working on being organic certified, according to Penza.

COLLABORATING TO SERVE

PWPM merchants work together to ensure shopping at the market is a positive experience for customers. “Whether that means combining orders, arranging delivery, working with our credit bureau, or simply offering expert advice on produce, we strive to offer comprehensive services that warrant return customers,” says Smith. “Our secret sauce is that we’re competitors who know that cooperation is the key to our survival.”

The PWPM merchants set the gold standard for collaboration by responding to collective needs as wholesalers and those of customers when they pulled together to plan and build the current facility, asserts John Vena. “The building operates like a co-operative, and that spirit of collaboration is on display every single day,” he says. “We buy from one another, we haul for one another, and, if need be, we store product for one another.”

Collotti notes they work together on the market, whether buying, selling, picking up or delivering. “There is more outside competition than ever, and to succeed, the market has to work as one,” he says.

Though having worked in produce for a long time, Coosemans’ Bartocci is fairly new to the Philly market. “We rely heavily on our neighbors to help us with services we don’t have the infrastructure for. For example, we rely on Levin for ripening. At the end of the day, we’re all friendly competitors, but we’re all a family of merchants.”

Philly’s collaboration benefits customers. “By having a dynamic and diverse group of multiple vendors, we are able to supply our customers with the best of what is around,” says Levin. “We are able to allow our customers to walk the market and see what’s available for purchasing, sample the product for taste, and shop prices — this keeps us all competitive and gives our customers a good buying experience.”

SERVING SUPPLIERS

Service has become increasingly important, not just to customers, but also to suppliers. “Shippers are looking for reliable partners who can help them meet market demand,” says Nardella’s Durante. “We provide our suppliers with market intelligence, feedback on the produce quality and logistical support.”

Forward distribution is an area where Coosemans supports shippers. “We have a lot of great vendors, and if they’re looking for more visibility in the market, we can help them,” says Bartocci. “They can use us as a hub, knowing we also sell a lot of their products. It’s a win-win for everyone.”

Penza points out the value of supporting shippers with other issues. “If shippers get less than full truckload orders, we are always able to fill out those orders so help save them on logistics and freight costs,” he says. “We also receive their rejections and can find another home or donate it.”

INTO THE FUTURE

The future of the Philly industry involves investing in young talent. “A lot of third and fourth generations are taking over the businesses and letting the older generations step back a bit,” says Durante. “As we’ve started to take the mantle more, it’s made a change in the business itself — for example, hours are shifting as far as when buyers are buying product, and technology is growing in use.”

As part of a fourth-generation family-owned-and-operated company, Levin emphasizes the great pride they have in the work done in the past. “But, we also look forward to what the future holds,” she says. “Part of our strategy for growth is in bringing in some new talent to help lead us into the future.”

DiFeliciantonio emphasizes the value of family generations. “My daughters and son-in-law are taking our company into the new generation,” he says. “Our customers are getting younger, so our younger staff can better relate to them. And, my brother-in-law is invaluable in passing his experience and work ethic along to the younger generations.”

Giving back is also an integral part of the future of service at PWPM. “Our commitment to service goes beyond the business transaction,” says Durante. “We’re very heavily involved in donating to charities, regionally and nationwide. This is important for us.”

For a little over three years, PWPM has been partnering with Sharing Excess, a daily gleaning operation housed at the PWPM facility.

“In that time, we’ve rescued over 20 million pounds of fresh produce, diverting it from the landfill,” says Smith. “According to Sharing Excess’ director of food sourcing, they are able to save about 90% of what our wholesalers send them. This is a win-win in every respect.”

There is no going backward, regarding service for customers, states John Vena. “Our challenge is to determine what services will be required in the future and to build them into our planning and our offering,” he says.