What are bulk foods?
Bulk foods have a long history and were pretty much the norm for grocery shopping until the 1960s. When people would go grocery shopping in the past, they bought larger amounts of goods, especially items like flour, sugar, and other baking products. There were several reasons for this, including that there just wasn’t the capability to individually package items into smaller amounts like we have now. Another reason was that more people made food items from scratch instead of buying mixes or premade items, which meant they were using a lot of products on a regular basis.
Eventually, grocery shopping evolved and bulk foods were no longer the default choice in grocery stores. Items were packaged into smaller portions for convenience, but also at a higher unit price point. Even though we now have endless options when food shopping, bulk foods are still widely available, especially in more rural areas with locally owned and run grocery stores that specialize in selling bulk foods.
What is a bulk foods distributor?
A bulk foods distributor, like Dutch Valley Food Distributors, works on a company level to sell wholesale bulk foods. Our bulk foods are sent to stores that then sell them in bulk quantities or repackage them into different amounts. We provide local businesses, from family-owned and run country stores, to larger chain stores in our local community, with bulk products that they sell to their customers. They save by purchasing the wholesale bulk foods from us and pass those savings onto their customers. More and more people are seeing the benefits of buying in bulk, so these stores that offer products from a wholesale bulk foods distributor have seen an increase in customers the last few years.
Who can buy from a bulk foods distributor?
It depends on the bulk foods distributor, what you’re purchasing, and how much you need. Some distributors only sell to businesses, while others sell mostly to individuals. There are many stores that sell bulk foods, but those are different from a wholesale bulk foods distributor. At Dutch Valley, we are a wholesale bulk foods distributor and specialize in selling to businesses of diverse sizes that repackage our products to sell to their customers. Other companies, like AllBulkFoods, sell to individuals.
Benefits of buying from a wholesale bulk foods distributor
There are many benefits in buying from a bulk food distributor. For businesses, and individuals, it leads to savings per unit of products. Being able to directly purchase bulk foods leads to less packaging and waste since your business doesn’t have to package the items themselves or combine smaller amounts of product.
For grocery stores, especially those in areas that do not have a robust wholesale bulk foods market, choosing to sell bulk foods in store is an excellent choice and establishes them in their local community as the go-to store to buy in bulk.