Formally known as Greenridge Farm, the company rebranded last year, launching a new website and logo alongside a new name.
Founded in 2008, by brothers Sebastian and Michael Madej, the Chicago-based brand specializes in all-natural uncured deli meats, sausages, cheeses and condiments. Greenridge offers over 100 products, including a Greenridge Naturals line that is lower in sodium, free of fillers, MSG, gluten, and soy, with no added nitrates, nitrites, or phosphates, artificial colors, or flavors. Greenridge uses artisanal production methods, including proprietary spice blends to season their pork, turkey, chicken, and beef, which are all hand-trimmed, slow-marinated and naturally smoked with spices from Europe that are blended in house.
Greenridge products are available at retailers, including Costco and Jewel locations, throughout Illinois, Michigan and Indiana and shipped DTC.
After 15 years in business, you rebranded – what was the inspiration behind the new name and logo?
About 10 years ago, we established the Greenridge brand as a mainstream meat company producing clean simple meat offerings. With the success of the brand and bringing great natural products to customers all across the country over the years, we wanted to make a cleaner and minimal look that really emphasizes our natural meats. We are excited to continue to bring our brand to the larger national market with our new branding, as well as expand our product portfolio.
Your meats are from Midwestern farmers and seasoned with a spice blend from Europe; how does Greenridge approach sourcing?
We are a family-owned brand and that is felt in the personal relationships we have with our suppliers, who we work closely with, particularly those in Europe. We have strong and longstanding ties in Poland, Germany and Italy where many of our spices are sourced. We are also heavily focused on our all-natural and clean-label offerings, so we are incredibly detailed and attentive when sourcing both meat and spices.
What can you tell R&FF about Greenridge’s foodservice business and how you expect it to impact production?
We have always made products for foodservice customers but in the last year have really emphasized working with key partners to introduce all-natural hams, as well as our all-natural sausages like Black Forest and Kale & Asiago Chicken Sausages. Our current production capabilities allow us to develop products for foodservice seamlessly, and as we expand, we plan to build out a larger foodservice production arm.
The new Greenridge website features an expanded e-commerce platform; how does Greenridge distribute its products to retailers and through DTC?
We have a dedicated team of salespeople who maintain and update products in our current retailers while expanding into additional retailers and food service throughout the country. Over the last two years, we have put a lot of energy into our e-commerce platform, tweaking and fine-tuning the digital shopping experience, particularly as it relates to our shipping process, and have seen a significant increase in online sales and traffic. We've grown our offerings on Instacart, and are actively working to have our entire product portfolio on our website so customers can get all of our products throughout the U.S.
In 2023 alone, Greenridge has rebranded and released new products. What is on the horizon for Greenridge?
We are excited to get our new snack sticks made for C-stores and retailers to market. These just debuted at the National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS) convention and include our popular beef and chicken sticks in four flavors and convenient snack sizes. We are also expanding our production facilities. Currently under construction, our newest facility will allow us to produce our all-natural deli meats in a sliced format that will cater to the convenient on-the-go options that we've seen a huge increase in over the past couple of years. This is part of our larger expansion plan going into 2024 to offer more sizing and packaging options.
