Humboldt Creamery was formerly an
agricultural marketing cooperative located on the
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
North Coast currently owned by
Foster Farms Dairy of
Modesto, California.
History
The co-op produced as much as 10 million gallons of
ice cream
Ice cream is a sweetened frozen food typically eaten as a snack or dessert. It may be made from milk or cream and is flavoured with a sweetener, either sugar or an alternative, and a spice, such as cocoa or vanilla, or with fruit such as ...
annually in addition to
milk
Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digest solid food. Immune factors and immune-modula ...
,
butter
Butter is a dairy product made from the fat and protein components of churned cream. It is a semi-solid emulsion at room temperature, consisting of approximately 80% butterfat. It is used at room temperature as a spread, melted as a condimen ...
,
cheese, and other products under its own label and a variety of other labels, and was the sole producer of
Costco
Costco Wholesale Corporation (Trade name, doing business as Costco Wholesale and also known simply as Costco) is an American multinational corporation which operates a chain of membership-only Big-box store, big-box retail stores (warehouse c ...
premium ice cream.
This contract and purchases in 2004 of several other ice cream companies made it one of the largest ice cream producers in the western United States.
The co-op originally provided fresh milk for local markets, and converted production in excess of local demand to butter and powdered milk for export. Production shifted from butter to ice cream when butter prices dropped following the collapse of the Soviet Union. The organic label and related regional success helped the company prepare to go national in marketing at the end of 2008, at which time it was owned 75 percent by local farmers and 25 percent by Dairy Farmers of America.
Financial problems came to light after the abrupt resignation of 12-year veteran CEO Rich Ghilarducci on February 20, 2009.
Bankruptcy was filed two months later, resulting in the sale of assets of the Humboldt Creamery at auction on August 27, 2009, to Foster Farms Dairy for $19.25 million.
The former CEO pleaded guilty to changing the values of the Creamery's receivables and payables for three years between 2005 and 2008.
He was sentenced to 30 months in Federal prison and ordered to pay $7 million in restitution for a "single count of making false statements to an agricultural credit bank".
The bankruptcy proceedings and sale resulted in many changes for the company. Primary storage and production facilities remained at the original site in
Fernbridge, California, and frozen products were still based in a
Stockton, California, facility. However, under order of the Santa Rosa bankruptcy court, a more recently acquired facility in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
and older property located in
Loleta, California
Loleta (Wiyot: ''Guduwalhat'') is a census-designated place in Humboldt County, California. Loleta is located south of Fields Landing, and south of Eureka at an elevation of . The population was 783 at the 2010 census. Residents live in a cent ...
, were divided off for separate sale. The operation and all of its products had always been free of synthetic or added
rbST hormone.
See also
*
Dairy farming
Dairy farming is a class of agriculture for long-term production of milk, which is processed (either on the farm or at a dairy plant, either of which may be called a dairy) for eventual sale of a dairy product. Dairy farming has a history th ...
References
External links
*{{Official Website, http://www.humboldtcreamery.com
Foster Farms website
Dairy products companies in California
Companies based in Humboldt County, California
Agricultural marketing cooperatives
Agriculture in California
Agricultural cooperatives in the United States