Heath & Lejeune Inc, a full-service distributor of organic fruits and vegetables, which was founded in 1981, started its 33-year history “as more of a national distributor and service provider,” according to Patrick (Rick) C. Lejeune, chief executive officer, whose father, Patrick, was one of the founders of the company.

While the company’s national business continues to grow, “we have transitioned over the last 10 years into a greater share of the Southern California market,” Lejeune told The Produce News. “We are continuing to build our customer base” in Los Angeles and throughout Southern California. “We’ve got a very strong sales team that is actively growing our Los Angeles, Orange County and Ventura County customer base.”

The company has been primarily concentrating on small customers, he said. They may have only a single store or restaurant or juice bar, “but these are small companies entrepreneurial in spirit that have really embraced organics. We find that they fit nicely into our program, so that is where a lot of our growth is.”

It has been “remarkable” to see how many startups there are “that are attempting to get on the wave of organic and healthy foods,” Lejeune said.

The growing popularity of juice bars has been a remarkable trend, reflective of “custumers’ desires to consume more fresh fruit and vegetables. One of the ways they are doing it is through juices,” many of which are either cold pressed or high-pressure pasteurized, “where the goal is to keep more of the nutrients in their natural state. That has been a huge driver for us,” he said.

Also, in the organic business, “there is a little bit of a renaissance going on” with retail stores that are trying to put more emphasis on organic produce, Lejeune said. “Sometimes individual stores or the small chains are a little bit more aggressive on that than the big chains.” The larger chains “are all embracing organics, of course, but they can’t be quite as nimble, sometimes, and as flexible” as the smaller operations.

Heath & Lejeune’s growth in the Southern California market is largely due to the growing demand for locally produced products, Lejeune said.

“We have a natural grower base in California,” and largely in Southern California, that can satisfy the growing demand for locally grown organic produce, “so it is natural for us to be intermediaries — the hub that connects the local grower to the local market.”

Servicing a national market “involves more reliance on a larger and maybe less sustainable infrastructure that drives prices higher,” he continued. Higher freight costs are a component of that as is the freshness factor. “There is something natural about working in your local market. It just seems like a more sustainable activity.”

That said, “We are probably doing as much or more nationally” as ever, he added. “We still provide a lot of services nationally in the area of storage and consolidation, and we do have strategic relationships with wholesalers and retailers in various regions of the country, and we still consider them to be an integral part of our operations.”

The reality is that Southern California is uniquely able to meet most of its needs year-round with local production, whereas during much of the year many parts of the country would simply not have access to many of the products companies like Heath & Lejeune offer if they relied solely on local production.

Even in Southern California that is true for some products and during some seasons. For that reason, “in the organic world, the growth of organic production in Mexico and Central America and South America has been explosive,” and at Heath & Lejeune, “we are becoming more and more of an importer from Peru,” Lejeune said.

For example, “for many years we have been importing fresh ginger root from Peru and distributing that nationally and into Canada.” The variety is primarily “the yellow ginger” which, I think, is a nicer ginger, a better looking ginger” than the Chinese white variety, “and it is becoming more popular.”

Up to now, Heath & Lejeune has been bringing the Peruvian ginger only into Los Angeles for distribution, but the plans are to begin bringing it to the East Coast as well, he said.

This year, the company is also bringing organic avocados from Peru into the United States. Those are all coming into the East Coast and being sold f.o.b. from Philadelphia “to our East Coast clientele,” Lejeune said. “Our partner in Peru is wanting to move forward with building a larger presence in the U.S. for organic produce.”