Case Study: Flagship Food Group

Flagship Food Group is a global, diversified food company serving the retail, club store, and food service channels across a broad array of product lines.  Its brands include TJ Farms®, Lilly B’s®, 505 Southwestern®, Chris & Pitts®, and Su Ming®.  It also serves as a valuable supplier to private label customers and provides industry services to food companies through its logistics and packaging divisions.  The company is now headquartered in Greenwood Village, Colorado.

About the Company

• Flagship began in 2005 when a group of entrepreneurs acquired a small retail food business, Oh! Boy® Foods, in Los Angeles.
• Using the "buy and build" strategy, Flagship has successfully brought over a dozen businesses together under a single enterprise.
• The company now represents over $240 million in sales.
• The 505 Southwestern® brand is one of the country's fastest growing, with authentic sauces and salsas made with Hatch Valley green chiles.
• The company has locations in Denver, Los Angeles, Palo Alto, Albuquerque, Boise, Indianapolis, Seattle and Minneapolis.
• One retailer Flagship produces private label foods for is Trader Joe's.
• Flagship products are sold in over 30,000 retail outlets.

In New Mexico

• Expanded to New Mexico in October 2014.
• Flagship buys more than 2.5 million pounds of New Mexico's famous Hatch Green Chile annually.
• The manufacturing facility in Albuquerque employs about 300.
• Flagship announced a $1.5 million expansion to the manufacturing facility in 2017, which will add 100 new jobs.
• In 2017 Flagship expanded its presence in New Mexico with a new distribution hub in Albuquerque.
• The company signed a 10-year lease on a 76,000 square foot warehouse in the Meridian Business Park.
• Flagship invested $3 million to turn the empty warehouse into a distribution center, which will eventually employ about 200.
• The warehouse includes on the state's largest cold storage freezers, which is about half the footprint at the site.
• The company has tripled its distribution since opening the Albuquerque manufacturing facility.

Economic Development Toolbox

• JTIP commitment of $355,186 in 2015 and 2016
• LEDA investment of $700,000 in 2015 and 2017

Learn more about Flagship Food Group.