Local Ag Company Earns Golden Award                 
Kelly Nix from The Californian, April 30, 2002

A Salinas agricultural company accepted a prestigious gold medal award at
Carnegie Hall in New York last week for its brand of lettuce.

Mills Family Farms, 375 W. Market St., was presented the Gold Taste Award for its Great Northern Wholeaves® lettuce. Jim Mills, senior vice president, was on hand to receive the award last week in New York.

The winning product is single lettuce leaves that are removed by hand from the core using a patented no-cut process, individually selected, cleaned and hand packed.

"We are certainly honored to have this product win the award," Mills said. "We are very proud of the product and this proves our faith in excellence and putting out an outstanding product."

The award was presented by the American Tasting Institute, a division of the Awards of the Americas. Mills Family Farms was chosen because the lettuce had a superior taste, appearance, freshness and overall impression, Mills said.

The award was won for food service in December and was selected by a panel of professional chefs, who tasted the lettuce blindfolded. Great Northern Wholeaves® won all categories, winning first place for its romaine hearts, romaine crowns, green and red leaf crowns.

Mills said the company sells the lettuce to regional and national restaurant chains and food service distributors. Restaurant chains like Arby's and Boston Market uses Mills Family Farms lettuce, he said.

"This is a very prestigious award particularly because you can use this gold leaf award logo on the packaging," Mills said.

Mills Family Farms has been in operation about 50 years and have supplied the foodservice industry, retailers, wholesalers and brokers with lettuce and a variety of vegetables. The company ships more than 10 million cartons annually from 12,000 acres of farmland.

Another company with a Salinas office, Ready Pac Produce, Inc., won the award for the fourth year in a row in the freshly cut produce category for the consumer market.

"I think it's picking up recognition," Ready Pac Vice President of Marketing Bill Zinke said of the award. "I would say of the recognized programs of the culinary world this is the best known of them."

Ready Pac, based in Southern California, is best known for its pre-packaged lettuce and salads.