A 40-year-old Spokane company that started as a corn-dog maker and evolved into a fruit-juice packager with revenues projected at $40 million this year says it will seek to make further acquisitions and eventually could become a national player.


The company, Olympic Foods Inc., employs 90 people here at its 116,000-square-foot plant on the West Plains and another 50 workers at a plant near Los Angeles it acquired two years ago. It became a unit of Seattle-based Darigold Inc. in 1995.


We are very opportunistic about looking for acquisitions, says Doug Koffinke, president and CEO of Olympic Foods. We believe such opportunities will be there in the future.


The company bought McCain Citrus Inc., of Fontana, Calif., in 2004, which gave it a 52,000-square-foot juice-box plant about 40 miles east of Los Angeles.


Koffinke says revenues from the companys two plants have grown by nearly 20 percent in the past two years, and he expects that the companys plants will reach annual revenues of more than $50 million within five years, but says Olympic wont be able to grow nationally unless it makes acquisitions.


We have plenty of capacity to grow, and our goal is to fill that capacity with the personnel we have now, he says. Still, he says, without acquiring packagers in other parts of the country, We cant reach out nationally from Spokane because of the increased cost of freight and transportation.


Olympic Foods packages and distributes fruit juices under its own brand names, which include Citrus Sunshine and Natures Genuine, and also under private-label arrangements with such grocery chains and distributors as Albertsons Inc., Fred Meyer Stores Inc., Safeway Inc., Quality Food Centers, and Western Family Foods Inc. It also packages drinks for Tree Top Inc. and Newmans Own Organics, Koffinke says.


While most of what we do (for Olympics own brands) is 100 percent juices, with exceptions for punches, lemonade, and nectars, everything we do for other customers is made according to each ones specific formula, he says.


Olympics private-label customers typically have detailed specifications regarding color and flavor of their products and want certain amounts of ingredients such as pulp, calcium, and vitamins in the products Olympic packages for them.


Koffinke says 75 percent of Olympics revenues come from orange juice, about 10 percent from apple juice, and the rest from many, many other things.


Although most of the companys products are sold in liquid form, some juice-filled containers, up to 10 ounces in size, are sold frozen to schools, hospitals, and other health- care facilities. The contents of those containers are thawed before being served, Koffinke says.


Inside Olympics plant here, big machines produce high-density polyethylene plastic bottles and paperboard containers, ranging in capacity from 4 fluid ounces to one gallon, into which the plants filling machines inject juices. The automated system, which includes a web of conveyor belts, also boxes and wraps the containers for shipment to retailers. Koffinke says some of the machines in the building cost as much as $5 million.


As many as eight 6,000-gallon truckloads of orange juice or orange juice concentrate arrive weekly at the plant, located at 5625 W. Thorpe Road, which Olympic has operated since 1986 and has expanded twice since, says Koffinke. The plant also gets a smaller number of truckloads of apple juice. Grape and other juices arrive in 55-gallon barrels.


Everything we bring into Spokane County is in juice form, he says. We dont process any fruit.


The plant can store 50,000 gallons of orange juice concentrate, the equivalent of about 350,000 gallons of orange juice once water is added, and another 50,000 gallons of non-concentrated orange juice at one time.


At the end of the production line, fork lifts whisk away pallets of packaged fruit juices to large coolers, where most drinks are stored at 34 degrees Fahrenheit, or to freezers, where the companys frozen products are stored at minus 20 degrees.


Olympics plant in Southern California primarily packages juice in aseptic boxes, ranging in capacity from 4 to 10 fluid ounces, that dont require refrigeration after theyre packaged, Koffinke says.


The juice business, says Koffinke, has been hit by big increases in costs in recent years due to hurricanes.


Florida is a big player in the orange juice industry, and the hurricanes there the past two years have not only severely damaged crops, but caused secondary crop diseases that have tightened the supply of raw materials, he says.


Koffinke says the price of orange juice, which is traded on the futures market, has tripled in the past 24 months, yet Olympic Foods has bumped its prices only about 30 percent.


He says Olympic has been able to hold its own prices down because the cost of the orange juice it buys is only one component of the products total cost. He says the cost of processing, packaging, plastic, and freight havent risen as dramatically.


The Spokane company regularly buys orange juice from Florida, California, Mexico, and Brazil, and apple juice primarily from within Washington state and from China. Grape juice can be purchased from many locations in the U.S., as well as from Argentina, Germany, and Chile, he says.


Another key to Olympics future success will be its ability to adapt its packaging, Koffinke says. The company, he says, must be ready to integrate newer, better types of plastics into its packaging and to buy specialized equipment to produce innovative shapes and sizes of containers that display products better.


He says health and wellness is no longer just a buzz phrase, but instead represents consumer-driven standards that the juice industry must meet.


Olympics origins date back to 1966, when Olympic Corn Products Inc. was formed. It adopted the Olympic Foods name in 1980 when it and its then 6-year-old subsidiary, Early Bird Juice Co., consolidated. It sold off its corn-dog operation to Foster Farms Inc., of Livingston, Calif., in 1996.


One year before that, Darigold bought a controlling interest in Olympic Foods from a group of Spokane owners, then gradually increased its ownership until 2004, when Olympic Foods became a wholly owned subsidiary of Darigold.


Contact Rocky Wilson at (509) 344-1264 or via e-mail at [email protected].