“We are very excited to be celebrating our second anniversary in this new facility,” said John Vena, president of John Vena Inc., located at the Philadelphia Wholesale Produce Market. “We operate from five units: F-1 through F-5. Our traditional wholesale business operates from units F-1 through F-4.  Unit F-5 is totally dedicated to the avocado business. There we built our own state of the art ripening rooms, and we do storage and distribution for West Pak Avocado Inc., our partners in the avocado business.”

During the past year, the company’s line has not changed too much. Mr. Vena said that instead he has gotten into more volume with items with which the company is most comfortable.

John Vena, president of John Vena Inc., displays a case of BellaVita oranges.“For example, our market share and volume have grown in avocados, persimmons, papayas and coconuts,” he said. “In addition, we find ourselves adding more services for certain customers, such as special packaging or product presentation.”

After almost two years on the market, Mr. Vena feels that the most noticeable thing about the PWPM facility is how easy it is to get work done.

“In the old market, rather basic tasks like loading a truck that didn’t match our dock height perfectly — which was constantly changing due to the settling of that old building — required some fairly tricky and time consuming techniques,” he explained. “Here we can have a dock leveler on and off a truck at any height at the push of a button. We clean our store in half the time each day, and we have twice as much space.”

He also pointed out that product on the dock isn’t melting before your eyes in warm weather, or getting chilled on cold days. The aisles are wide, allowing two-way traffic everywhere in the building, including in the coolers.

“This has all pushed our ability to serve customers way beyond anything we had in the old building,” he added.

Mr. Vena serves as a director on the PWPM board, and he is chairman of the PWPM Marketing Committee.

“Our marketing committee is a rather informal group, but we get participation from about a third of our membership,” he said. “The committee is responsible to draft marketing plans and to implement those plans.”

“In fact we are about to roll out our 2013 campaign,” Mr. Vena continued. “We hope to reach those in the industry who have been skeptical about our ability to serve customers from this new building. As we approach our second birthday, I think it is very important to note, that the merchants that came into this facility with a clear understanding of the difficulties associated with moving a business, and had properly prepared themselves and their teams, are still here and recording higher sales figures than in the first year.”

Many people in the industry, he added, discounted the PWPM tenant’s ability to survive as a viable marketplace for produce.

“And yes, our costs are higher than they were at the old market, but by paying that cost we have better prepared ourselves for the future,” he said. “As we said on the day we opened: this market is the future of fresh.”

John Vena’s basic customer range is from Boston to Virginia, including all of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland. The company has always been strong in both foodservice and retail, and at all levels.

“Lately we have seen a few more customers in food processing take an interest in our line,” Mr. Vena noted.

The company recently announced seven positions that it needs to fill as quickly as possible.

“Most of these job openings are due to growth,” said Mr. Vena. Also, we are celebrating the careers of three employees who have been with us for 30 years.

“As we add new services, we find that we need to automate some of our processes so we will also be shopping for some new equipment over the next few months.”

John Vena Inc., Mr. Vena said, is very keen to increase not only the amount of local product that it handles, but also to shine a spotlight on the surprisingly large volume of local product that it has always carried.

“This will require a little marketing on our part, but I believe our customers want this information,” he said. “We have entered into an arrangement with Bright Farms, a national company that is building greenhouses to produce ‘super local’ to handle fresh herbs and baby lettuce. The company is just now beginning to harvest in its greenhouse a few miles from here.”

John Vena takes food safety very seriously.

“We were the first company in the Philadelphia Market to be certified by first, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and then by PrimusLabs.com in good handling practices,” he said. “We are audited annually, and we just passed our most recent audit in March 2013.”