By Jessica Davis, JTNews Correspondent
Since he founded his organic produce home delivery business in 1997, Ronny Bell has seen a rapidly growing interest in Pioneer Organics.
Bell, 31, used to work in his home state of New York as a distributor of organic produce. He later learned more about organic food and the industry while attending the University of Wisconsin. When he moved to Seattle in 1995, Bell started out selling organic produce from farms to natural food stores. He decided to start a business that would deliver the produce directly to consumers’ homes and in 2001, he was named to the Puget Sound Business Journal’s “40 under 40” list. The following year, his business was honored with the Mayor’s Small Business Award.
“I always envisioned having my own business,” said Bell.
In the fall of 2003, Pioneer Organics purchased the assets of the Portland branch of Urban Organic, an organic produce service based in Brooklyn, N.Y. Pioneer Organics now serves 250 customers out of its Portland warehouse and just moved to a larger space to accommodate its rapidly growing customer base.
The Seattle branch has also seen continued growth, currently serving over 4,000 customers in the Puget Sound region, from Everett to Tacoma and Issaquah to Bainbridge Island. Pioneer does not grow its own produce, but instead obtains it from local farms along the West Coast.
Entrepreneurship runs in his family. His grandfather is the founder of Hebrew National Kosher Foods—of hot dog and salami fame. But Bell, who was a vegetarian in college, has taken a decidedly different path and is committed to making his company environmentally and socially conscious.
His home delivery service, Pioneer Organics, provides organic produce as well as a small line of organic groceries. He offers a seasonally rotating variety of 14–16 different kinds of fruits and vegetables, available in four box sizes ranging in price from $21–$50. Cooking instructions and recipes are also included.
A small spring variety box might include Empire apples, a bunch of bananas, a pound and a half each of red potatoes and red onions, and broccoli to name a few, but the contents differ each week. Customers also have the option to permanently remove a delivery item and have it replaced with something else. The organic produce offers a healthy alternative to consumers hoping to avoid chemicals and pesticides.
“It’s a better quality product,” said Bell.
Besides delivering fresh organic produce to homes, the company recycles and reuses its cardboard delivery boxes, uses tree-free paper products, composts all food scraps and runs part of its vehicle fleet on clean-burning natural gas. Bell hopes to offer cooking classes to his customers and make Pioneer Organics more of a full-service grocer.
For information or to register for the service, call 206-632-3424 in Seattle, 503-460-2729 in Portland or visit www.pioneerorganics.com.