“We originally started out as Alaska Carrot Company in 1999, and were bought by Charlie's Produce two years ago,” said John Baldiviez, general manager of Charlie's Produce. “This has been great for the company and allowed us to make the improvements that we needed to compete in the food service sector.”

Baldiviez and his wife, Jinna, started the Alaska Carrot Co. to promote the baby carrots grown by Matanuska Valley grower Ben Vanderweele.

“Those (baby carrots) are Alaska's best kept secret, and taste more like candy than a veggie,” Baldiviez said.

High demand for the carrots convinced Baldiviez of the product's popularity.

But a shorter growing season and high demand both in wholesale and the restaurant sector forced Baldiviez to ship products from outside Alaska to augment his business.

Now a 30,000-square-foot plant located in a 80,000-square-foot building in south Anchorage is thriving by creating a value-added product. There, machinery cuts and dices vegetables and fruits, and packages them for resale at Sam's Club and Costco.

Sales manager Jerry Speer, left, and John Baldiviez, general manager of Charlie's Produce, show off value-added, precut fruit platters and vegetables created by Charlie's Produce in its South Anchorage plant. PHOTO/Rob Stapleton/AJOC

Charlie's Produce has 70 employees in Alaska, and grosses $12 million yearly as it works around the clock 24/7, according to Baldiviez.

Charlie's is known as a produce and vegetable distributor in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and now Alaska. Charlie's Distribution Centers are located in Seattle and Spokane, Wash., Portland and Bend, Ore., Anchorage and Dutch Harbor.

The improvements finished in July 2006, have allowed the company to produce what it calls “Grab and Go” value-added products to add to its basic wholesale produce distribution in Alaska.

“You have probably seen these in Costco and Sam's Club in the form of bagged salads, pre-cut mushrooms and veggie platters,” said Jerry Speer, sales manager for the company. “But we have expanded into bagging toppings for take-out pizza delivery businesses too.”

While Sam's Club and Costco have different toppings on their pizzas, the fresh veggies you see were cut by Charlie's Produce in a sanitized production room.

Charlie's also sells products to the McDonalds chains in Alaska.

Baldiviez is modest about his contribution to the industry in Alaska but has been one of the start-up owners of Di Tomaso's Fruit & Vegetables, and designed the cutting room floor at Alaska Fresh Cut.

At Charlie's Produce the design and layout of the production room equipment, in and out, is the work of Baldiviez.

Born into a family that sold produce in California, Baldiviez says that Alaska is a tough market.

“Alaska is a unique market, and I should know, I grew up in the business in northern and southern California,” Baldiviez said. “The temperatures here alone are all over the map — hot, cold and chilly.”

Speer, from Phoenix, Ariz., concurs that the Alaska market differs.

“We are expanding into the camp and construction business as well as Anchorage restaurants and food service producers, and restaurants in Denali that want local-grown products. It is far different here than anyplace I have ever worked,” Speer said.

“Aramark in Denali National Park demands Alaskan-grown products,” Baldiviez said.

Inside the cutting room, workers place and remove sliced tomatoes in late January that will be packaged as a value-added produce product created at Charlie's Produce and the Alaska Carrot Co. on King Street in Anchorage. PHOTO/Rob Stapleton/AJOC

Charlie's Produce is a subsidiary of Seattle-based Triple B Corp. Co. and is located in a 80,000-square-foot warehouse building on King Street in Anchorage that formerly housed Food Service of America.

The next step for the company, Baldiviez said, is to further help market and promote the Alaska Grown program. Despite the fact that Charlie's can buy vegetables from California all year long at a lower price than from growers in the Valley, Baldiviez believes in an Alaska product.

“I want to tie us together with the Alaskan Grown program,” Baldiviez said. “I want us to be the Alaska wholesaler that promotes Alaskan-grown products like they should be.”