SAN FRANCISCO — GrubMarket announced it has completed the acquisition of Vernon, California-based Rainfield Marketing Group, a well-known and highly respected fresh produce company that provides the highest quality fruits, vegetables, and Asian specialty items sourced from some of the most prominent suppliers across the U.S., Mexico, and Korea, among other global locations. Rainfield Marketing Group currently operates in California, selling to hundreds of large grocery retailers, multi-unit restaurant groups, foodservice companies, and wholesale customers across the U.S., and has a strong reputation as a leader in food safety practices.
Founded in 2015, Rainfield Marketing Group is run by original owner, Richard Choe, a 10-year veteran of the fresh produce space, alongside President Greg Emi, an experienced produce executive with over two decades of experience. Today, Rainfield Marketing Group is a full-service food distribution and wholesale business with state-of-the-art climate and humidity-controlled warehouse facilities covering over 150,000 square feet in space. Though they sell dozens of products, including specialty items like Okinawa sweet potato, enoki mushrooms, king oyster mushrooms, and various Korean radish varieties, Rainfield Marketing Group is best known for being one of the largest shippers of green onions in the nation through their SAKURA private label. In addition, Rainfield Marketing Group is committed to maintaining the highest food safety standards, having received GAP and PrimusGFS certifications. After the acquisition, the business will continue to be managed by its current experienced and mission-driven leadership team.
“Rainfield’s mission is to be the specialty produce grower and shipper of choice across the country through exceptional service, consistent quality, and second-to-none food safety standards. We are thrilled to join the GrubMarket team, who shares our goals and embodies the qualities needed to build a thriving food business. We are also excited to access GrubMarket’s impressive grower network and leverage their incomparable eCommerce and technology-enabled platform to continue bringing high-quality fresh produce and specialty items to GrubMarket’s end customers,” said Richard Choe, founder of Rainfield Marketing Group.
According to Mike Xu, CEO of GrubMarket: “Rainfield Marketing Group has built a best-in-class reputation for being a top provider of exotic and specialty fresh produce, most notably green onions, peaches, and persimmons. They are one of the most influential and well-known Asian produce distributors in California and supply many big grocery and restaurant chains, including most of the top Asian supermarkets in the country. Richard and his team have done a wonderful job scaling the company to double-digit, year-over-year revenue growth while maintaining a sterling reputation in food safety, having received most of the top food safety certifications. This acquisition enables GrubMarket to further strengthen our presence in California and expand our global sourcing power. We are thrilled to welcome the Rainfield Marketing Group team to the GrubMarket family.”
As a part of GrubMarket’s portfolio, Rainfield Marketing Group will utilize GrubMarket’s innovative and proprietary WholesaleWare software suite, the company’s software-as-a-service platform that empowers food industry wholesalers and distributors with seamless financial management, powerful sales, and online ordering features, precise inventory management, lot traceability, grower accounting, and automated routing and logistics, as well as Orders IO, GrubMarket’s custom branded mobile eCommerce solution.
About GrubMarket
Founded in 2014, GrubMarket is a San Francisco-based food technology company operating in the space of food supply chain eCommerce for both business customers and end consumers, as well as providing related software-as-a-service solutions to digitally transform the American and global food supply chain. Currently, GrubMarket operates in all 50 U.S. States; Ontario and British Columbia (Canada); Argentina, Chile, and Colombia (South America); India, Mexico, South Africa, and Spain, with plans to expand to the rest of the U.S., Canada, South America, and other parts of the world.
