FormuL.A. for Success

For decades, the Los Angeles Wholesale Produce Market has been an essential but gritty destination for buyers and sellers of fresh produce. Today, change is on the way to revitalize the entire district and better represent its importance to both Los Angeles and Southern California, not only for the international perishables industry but as a key West Coast commerce center.

Multiple Markets: Singular Focus
The City Market of Los Angeles is one of the oldest and largest produce markets in the United States. The present-day configuration of permanent stalls came out of the need for better organization and a cooperative was formed to capitalize the market and make improvements as it grew. Today’s Los Angeles Wholesale Produce Market (LAWPM), updated and overhauled in the late 1980s, is still known as the ‘new’ market.

The Los Angeles Wholesale Produce Market
Sam Thakker, sales director for Daaks International, Inc., says that the location of the market is certainly its greatest advantage. “It’s a central, one-stop shop with easy access within about three minutes of all the freeways. Customers come to us because they like to consolidate,” he notes. And though some of his fellow merchants around the country and Canada may beg to differ, he says, “No other market in the United States is as accessible.”

Coast Produce Company, Inc. has been on the market since 1986. Mark Morimoto, the company’s vice president for sales and marketing, finds fewer large chain buyers are walking the market. Instead, most rely on distribution centers and electronic ordering systems. “On the flip side,” he observes, “many large independent retailers still come to the market—companies such as Gelson’s, Stater Bros., Northgate, Super King, and Superior Markets. Even Whole Foods, a national retailer, sends its regional buyers to the LAWPM. The market is still an excellent place to showcase new and unique items that must be seen to be fully appreciated.”

Sean Barton, vice president of sales and procurement for Sigma Sales, agrees on the LAWPM’s benefits of location, but has a few thoughts on future needs. “It provides a seamless supply line for our company, 364 days a year,” he confirms, but adds, “Logistically, it’s good, but the infrastructure is behind and is in need of modernization. It’s become harder to maintain food safety—the buildings need new cold boxes to pass safety inspections. We’re still passing, but it costs us more money to repair and stay on top of it.”

Problems with infrastructure were also on the mind of Francisco Clouthier, president of Maui Fresh International, LLC in Los Angeles. “The roads around the Market can’t accommodate all the growth in the area from the clothing factories and the gentrification of the nearby Arts District. Trucks can’t park. People and businesses keep moving in, but the city hasn’t kept up.”

Despite the challenges, companies thrive at the confluence of old and new. Coosemans Los Angeles has been on the Market since the early 1980s. Jill Overdorf, director of business and culinary development at Coosemans L.A. Shipping in Vernon, says the best attribute of the LAWPM is that it’s a meeting place of both product and ideology. “Here, old school Los Angeles mixes with hip foodies to share information and products,” she enthuses. “While the concept of a produce marketplace seems antiquated, the twenty-first century food hub is just a reiteration of this century-old gathering place for farmers, sellers, and buyers.”