Cargill’s food ingredients and applications selected six North American distribution partners — Univar Inc., Gillco Ingredients, International Food Products Corp., Batory Foods, Pearson Sales Co. and St. Charles Trading Inc. This move optimizes the customer experience, streamlines the supply chain and creates a platform to generate sustainable growth through a select group of committed channel partners, Minneapolis-based Cargill said.
“In today’s rapidly changing marketplace, our customers need industry-leading distributor partners who can augment our in-house expertise with broad product portfolios for one-stop convenience, regulatory support, flexible lead times and minimum order quantities,” said Pat Rogers, commercial leader in Cargill’s North America food ingredients business. “We’re confident these partners can deliver on those expectations, bringing added value to our customers.”
Univar will distribute a broad range of Cargill’s products, including starches, specialty sweeteners, texturizers, cocoa and chocolate, and edible vegetable oils and fats. Univar’s distribution agreement extends throughout the United States and Canada, Cargill said.
Gillco will continue its U.S. distribution of Cargill products, with a focus on organic, label-friendly and specialty product lines, while International Food Products, an established player in the United States dairy segment will continue to offer Cargill ingredients suited for those applications, Cargill noted.
Long-time distributor partners Batory Foods, Pearson Sales Co. and St. Charles Trading Inc. will remain as authorized U.S. distributors for those legacy Cargill food ingredient portfolios they have carried in the past, the company added.
Cargill said it will continue to support additional distributors for other channels such as foodservice, retail and confectionary chocolate.
“These six partners will be powerful contributors to our business, bringing improvements to our North American supply chain, e-commerce, technical service expertise and other components critical to our customers’ success,” Rogers said. “By consolidating our regional distribution channels, our customers will be able to benefit from the unique strengths these distributors bring to the table.”
