HURON, OH - Mucci Farms announced that it’s officially harvesting from the first 24-acres of its 60-acre greenhouse expansion in Huron, Ohio.
“After years of hard work and strategic planning, we’re excited to hit another milestone in the Mucci Farms story,” said Bert Mucci, CEO, in a company press release. “We’re very appreciative of the strong partnership we’ve developed with The City of Huron, Huron Township, and Erie County officials to get the first 24-acre project off the ground.”
The entire 60-acre facility will be growing primarily tomatoes on-the-vine, in addition to some snack-sized specialty tomatoes. Mucci also announced that the entire 60-acres will be equipped with supplemental High Powered Sodium (HPS) lighting in order to grow through the winter months, allowing them to harvest Ohio grown tomatoes 365 days per year.
“We chose tomatoes on-the-vine because of its high demand year-round, particularly in the winter months,” said Joe Spano, Vice President of Sales & Marketing. “With grow lights in the entire facility, it was important to have a product that was always in demand.”
In addition to the remaining 36-acres of greenhouses being built in two remaining phases, Mucci Farms Ohio will include a 272,000-square-foot distribution facility that will be operational this summer. Harvesting from the final two phases will begin in the spring of 2019 and 2020.
“Expanding into Ohio allows us to reduce the food miles for our U.S. retailers and gives U.S. consumers their own locally grown vegetables,” explained Danny Mucci, President of Mucci International Marketing. “With such a high volume of our product already being shipped to the U.S., expanding into Huron was strategically done to improve efficiencies with logistics and food safety. Our proximity to market and avoiding a border crossing improves our opportunity to offer consumers with fresh, flavourful products with maximum shelf.”
Owning and operating over 200-acres of tomato, pepper, cucumber, lettuce, and strawberry greenhouses in Kingsville, Ontario, Mucci Farms also markets on behalf of 700 acres across the continent. An active community partner for initiatives focused on health, fitness, and education, the company plans to extend these commitments into Erie County.
“We are looking forward to getting familiar with Huron and Erie County over the next several months to find ways that we can be effective members of the community,” said Emily Murracas, Director of Marketing. “Once we are fully operational, we’ll be setting up a grand opening week to welcome city officials, media members, educators, and residents of Huron to tour our facility, learn about what we do, and share their ideas on ways we can be helpful to the local community.”
What will this latest move continue to look like for Mucci Farms? AndNowUKnow will report the latest.
