Blue Bell Creameries is an American food company that produces ice cream. Founded in 1907 in Brenham, Texas. For much of its early history, the company produced local ice cream and butter. In the mid-20th century, it left the production of butter and expanded throughout the state of Texas and soon most of South America. The company headquarters is located in "Little Creamery" in Brenham, Texas. Since 1919, already in the hands of the Kruse family. Although sold in limited quantities, by 2015 Blue Bell is the fourth highest ice cream brand in the United States as a whole.
Video Blue Bell Creameries
Histori
The company is rooted in the Brenham Creamery Company, which opened in 1907 to buy excess cream from local dairy farmers and sell butter to people in Brenham, Texas, a town about 70 miles northwest of Houston. In 1911, the creamery began to produce ice cream in small quantities.
In 1919, Creamery was in financial trouble and considered closing the door. The board of directors hired EF Kruse, a 23-year-old former school teacher, to take over the company on April 1, 1919. Kruse refused to receive salary for his first few months in that position so the company would not be placed in further debt. Under his leadership, the company expanded ice cream production to the nearby Brenham area and soon became profitable. On his advice, the company changed its name to Blue Bell Creameries in 1930 after Texas Bluebell, a native wildflower for Texas, and who likes ice cream thrives during the summer.
Until 1936, cream made ice cream with batch. It could make a 10-US-gallon (38Ã, L) batch of ice cream every 20 minutes. In the same year, in 1936, the company bought ice cream freezer with it, which can make 80 US gallon (300Ã,L) ice cream per hour. Ice cream will flow through the tap, allowing it to be poured into a container of any size.
Kruse was diagnosed with cancer in 1951 and died within 8 weeks. Her sons Ed and Howard took over the leadership of the company. In the 1960s, the company completely abandoned the production of butter and began to focus solely on ice cream. After years of selling ice cream only at Brenham, the company began selling ice cream in the Houston area, eventually growing in most of Texas including the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex and the state capital of Austin. In the late 1970s, sales increased fourfold, and by 1980, the factory produced more than 10 million gallons (37.850,000 liters) of ice cream per year, generating $ 30 million annually.
In 1989, Blue Bell began selling ice cream in Oklahoma, and throughout the 1990s expansion was driven throughout Central and South America, eventually evolving into New Orleans and Jackson, Mississippi. In 1992, Blue Bell built a new manufacturing facility in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Four years later, in 1996, Blue Bell opened a third manufacturing facility opened in Sylacauga, Alabama, east of Birmingham, and eventually expanded to Atlanta and Miami. Once Blue Bell builds itself in the marketplace, word-of-mouth usually ensures that consumers in adjacent areas become aware of the brand. Blue Bell is slow to expand: corporate executives say they are really researching every new market and ensuring that all employees in the new market are fully trained in Blue Bell practices so that product quality can be upheld. Blue Bell often tends to expand into the market during March each year, expanding to Colorado on March 14, 2011, followed by Richmond and Hampton Roads Virginia areas in 2013, and Las Vegas in 2014. This expansion is accompanied by the purchase and/or construction of distribution centers in a new market that serves an area within a radius of 75 miles.
By 2015, Blue Bell issued a series of withdrawals that eventually shut down production and caused all its products to be recalled on April 20, culminating in termination of employment and leave (as well as a reduction of the 23-country sales area) resulting from the shutdown in May next. Along with factory clearance procedures and agreements with state and federal authorities, the company returned to production three months later on a limited basis, returning its products to the market on August 31 in parts of Texas and Alabama as part of a five-phase plan to return to many pre- recall, which has been reduced to 20 countries based on Blue Bell's limited distribution capabilities in the near future.
Maps Blue Bell Creameries
Operation
In 2015, the company operates three manufacturing facilities, with the largest facility in Brenham, and additional facilities in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, and Sylacauga, Alabama. Prior to 2015, there were 50 sales and distribution centers, known as branches, scattered across the 23-country market. The facility employs a combined 2,800 employees, with 850 employees working outside Brenham. In 2006, annual sales exceeded $ 400 million.
Blue Bell retains control over all aspects of its business, especially to ensure quality control and use of freshly available ingredients. The Kruses claims "the milk we use is very fresh just yesterday's grass." The company uses milk from about 60,000 cows a day, and the cream used during daily production is always less than 24 hours. All production and packaging takes place in the Blue Bell facility, which is capable of generating over 100 pints per minute. Private vehicle drivers store store shelves so they can make sure the shelves are handled properly.
According to figures compiled by Statista, a market and statistical data portal, while the combined private label sold more, by 2014 Blue Bell is the best-selling ice cream brand in the United States. The sales area is mainly concentrated in the southern United States, and has been sold as far west as Las Vegas, as far north as Indianapolis and Denver, and as far east as Richmond, Virginia. Overall, the region covers only 20% of the United States. By comparison, each of the four major competitors of Blue Bell sells its products in more than 86% of the United States. To become one of the three largest ice cream producers, Blue Bell has consistently been the top seller in most of the markets the company has entered. For example, in the Texas home state, the company has 52% market share. Within five months of entering Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the company has collected 35% of the ice cream market. People who live outside the sales area can send ice cream to them (although this temporarily halted the company increasing production after withdrawal), and former President George W. Bush (former Governor of Texas) often has ice cream delivered to Camp David during his lifetime his government. In 2006 and 2012, astronauts at the International Space Station were also treated to Blue Bell ice cream "to help intelligence (the crew))."
Products
Blue Bell produces over 250 different frozen products. Of these, 66 flavors of ice cream. Twenty flavors are offered throughout the year, while an additional two to three dozen are offered on a seasonal basis. In addition to ice cream, the company produces frozen yogurt, sherbet, and various frozen dishes on sticks. Unlike competitors who have reduced their standard containers to 48-56 ounces of liquid (1.42 to 1.66 L), Blue Bell continues to sell half a gallon (64 fl oz/1.89 L) containers, a fact that is mentioned clearly in the ad.
Blue Bell introduced its flagship, Homemade Vanilla, in 1969 and was the first company to mass-produce Cookies' n Cream flavor. Although the company at one time made Cookies' n Cream from Oreo Nabisco cookies, purchasing regular retail packages, today he baked his own cookies. In 1997, Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla was the best selling single ice cream in the United States, and in 2001, Forbes named Blue Bell the best ice cream in the country.
RW Apple, Jr., of The New York Times claimed in 2006 that "[w] with its clean, vibrant and luxurious and luxurious consistency is achieved even though the butter fat content is slightly lower than some competitors, hook you up from the first spoon.Fully and nothing to miss is the sweetness, the calcareous texture, and the gummy and greasy sap that afflicts a lot of mass-produced ice cream. "
Sometimes, when Blue Bell enters the market, the company marks the occasion by introducing a regional flavor in that market. For example, upon entering Colorado on March 14, 2011, Blue Bell introduced a new exclusive flavor for Colorado, Rocky Mountain Road, made with more premium ingredients (including chocolate covered nuts and marshmallows) compared to Rocky throughout the year. Street. While the test market is in the Denver metropolitan area, there is speculation that other states will soon see Blue Bell on store shelves. Finally, these flavors will be distributed throughout the sales area of ​​Blue Bell.
Listeriosis Outbreak 2015
By 2015, Blue Bell issued its first withdrawal in its 108-year history. The recall was expelled on a variety of goods produced in his cremation, because of the discovery of five cases of listeriosis in Kansas believed to be caused by products manufactured at his factory in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Three out of five patients with listeria die.
Despite the subsequent series of withdrawals, and the temporary closure of the Broken Arrow plant, the "enhanced sampling program" launched by Blue Bell produced "some positive tests for Listeria in various places and plants", including three further cases in Texas. As a result, on the night of April 20, 2015, the company took precautions and expanded its withdrawal to cover all of its products - withdrawals of more than eight million gallons, to be disposed of in sanitary landfills.
At the same time, the company closed production and started cleanup and repair operations at its manufacturing facility. The FDA found that companies failed to follow standard practices to prevent contamination; two years prior to the withdrawal, the company "repeatedly finds listeria" at the Broken Arrow facility. At its main production facility in Brenham, one of its production machines (which produced most of the recalled products) was so polluted that Blue Bell announced it would stop using the engine permanently, and condensation was also reported at the Brenham facility.
Although a Blue Bell spokesman had previously commented on the loss of work, on May 15, Blue Bell announced a series of layoffs and leave. 1,450 (or 37 percent) of the company's employees will be laid off, while 1,400 employees are revoked until the cleaning/repair operations are completed, and the remaining 1,050 are involved in critical operations and cleaning/cleaning operations have reduced wages imposed on them.
In addition, due to limited supply and expected distribution capabilities in the near future, Blue Bell announced it will halt operations in 15 of over 50 unlimited distribution centers, although it does not rule out returning to these markets in the end. Affected distribution centers include:
- Phoenix, Arizona (2 branches)
- Tucson, Arizona
- Denver, Colorado
- Indianapolis, Indiana
- Kansas City, Kansas
- Wichita, Kansas
- Louisville, Kentucky
- Las Vegas, Nevada
- Albuquerque, New Mexico
- Charlotte, North Carolina
- Raleigh, North Carolina
- Columbia, South Carolina
- Richmond, Virginia
- Suffolk, Virginia (Hampton Roads area)
The recalls are so severe that they threaten to close the company; executives warned shareholders that they are facing a "capital crisis." On July 14, 2015, Sid Bass, a leading Texas investor, became a partner and investor of the company; Blue Bell secured a $ 125 million loan to continue operations. Around the same time, the Blue Bell plant in Sylacauga, Alabama re-produces, making test batches as part of a "test and hold" procedure in which ice cream is not packaged for sale until a negative batch test for all bacterial strains including strains of listeria responsible for the withdrawal.
Back
On August 17, 2015, Blue Bell announced a five-phase plan to return to the store shelves:
- Phase 1: Houston and Austin areas in Texas, plus Birmingham and Montgomery areas in Alabama (near the company's Sylacauga facility).
- Phase 2: North central Texas (Dallas-Fort Worth) and southern Oklahoma include Tulsa (near the company's Broken Arrow facility).
- Phase 3: Southwest Texas (San Antonio) and Oklahoma center including Oklahoma City.
- Phase 4: The majority of Texas plus southern Louisiana include Baton Rouge and New Orleans.
- Phase 5: Relics of Texas, Alabama, Oklahoma, and Louisiana, plus all Arkansas, Florida, and Mississippi as well as parts of Georgia, Kentucky, Missouri, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.
Even in countries where Blue Bell plans to return, it will not always return to all pre-recall markets in the last phase. Those markets, including Charlotte, Kansas City, Louisville & amp; Phoenix, is added based on the fact that Blue Bell will effectively serve the area. For now, Wichita, KS, Las Vegas, NV, and Richmond & amp; Suffolk, VA has not returned yet.
Phase 1 begins on August 31, 2015. Phase 2 begins in November, 2015. A month later phases 3 and 4 begin.
The day after the initial launch, September 1, Blue Bell resumed production at Broken Arrow, an Oklahoma facility.
On January 28, 2016, the company continued distribution to most of the Southeast AS.
In March 2018, the company began to distribute to most of Indiana, the central part of Kentucky & amp; north of New Mexico.
Justice Department Investigations
In December 2015, the CBS Evening News reported that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) has launched a federal criminal investigation into the Blue Bell Creameries, to determine "what Blue Bell executives know about contamination and unclean conditions , when they know, and what they do in response ". The investigation, by the DOJ Consumer Protection Branch, was reportedly led by trial lawyer Patrick Hearn, who managed to prosecute executives from Peanut Corporation of America in 2015. Mark Abueg, a DOJ spokesman, told Houston Press: policy, the Department of Justice in general does not justify or deny whether a problem is being investigated. "
See also
- List of dairy products in the United States
Further reading
- Inampudi, Naveen and Debbie Z. Harwell. "BLUE BELL: Rising Cream." Houston History Magazine . Center for Public History, University of Houston. Volume 9, No. 2. p.Ã, 2-7.
- Hlavaty, Craig. "Who exactly are the people in the Blue Bell ice cream parlor?" Houston Chronicle . Wednesday 4 September 2013.
- Ed Kruse - MyBestYears.com INTERVIEW SPOTLIGHT
References
External links
- Official website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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