Part VII: Becoming a leader in Asian-style foods
July 27, 2017 — Following the success of frozen-pizza sales in the 1970s and ’80s, it was time for Schwan’s Company to begin a new journey — making Asian-style foods.
Our egg-roll business began to take shape in 1985, when company leaders attended a food-service show and had sampled a delicious and familiar-tasting egg roll. Wanting to learn more about these egg rolls, the company sent its acquisitions chief and home-delivery marketing manager to the Minh foods facility in Texas, where the egg rolls were made.
While visiting the facility, Schwan’s employees spotted a Schwan’s™ Plum Creek packaging label in the facility’s test kitchen. The employees did some internal research and figured out that a Schwan’s™ Plum Creek egg-roll vendor had contracted with the Minh facility to supply Schwan’s subsidiaries with egg rolls.
Knowing that the plant could produce a quality product, company leaders made an offer to purchase the egg-roll manufacturing facility in Pasadena, Texas. In December 1986, the family that owned the plant finalized the sale and Schwan’s entered the Asian-style food manufacturing business. In 1995, the company added the Deer Park, Texas facility.
For many years, egg rolls have been among the top-selling products in the ethnic-snacks category. Our company has played a pivotal role in helping egg rolls achieve that position and continues to push the envelope for growth. Using several of our business channels, we have featured egg rolls in most of our product portfolios.
Today, our Asian-style foods portfolio is known to have much more than delicious egg rolls. Some of the most popular foods added to our portfolio include wontons, potstickers and crab rangoon. The products are sold under the Pagoda®, Minh® and Schwan’s® brands. Additionally, our team from Contract Partner Sales has also made egg rolls for external customers throughout the United States.
Here’s a list of our Asian-style foods:
- Pagoda® Asian-style snacks are distributed by Schwan’s Consumer Brands and primarily found in major grocery stores and retailers across the country. Currently, our Pagoda® brand is No. 1 in the U.S. frozen Asian-style snacks category. Visit www.PagodaSnacks.com and use the “Where to buy” tool to find Asian-style snacks nearest you.
- Minh® products can be found in club stores, schools, hospitals, convenience stores, restaurants, colleges and universities. It is distributed by our Schwan’s Food Service and Schwan’s Consumer Brands divisions.
- Asian foods under the Schwan’s® brand are carried by our home-delivery division, Schwan’s Home Service.
"Dining Through the Decades” is a blog series commemorating our company’s 65 years of commitment, quality, growth and service with customers, consumers and employees all across the United States. We invite you to stay tuned throughout the year as we continue to share some of our company's best stories and highlights of how we got to where we are now."
