Griffin Report Burris Logistics : Burr1
ADVERTORIAL Burris Logistics Thrives With Customer-Focused Culture ble to basic economics. Burris is in the food distribution business and people have to eat regardless of the state of the economy. But the company’s success has far deeper roots than people’s need for food. Donnie Burris President, Burris Logistics B eing in the food business isn’t easy at the dawn of the second decade of the 21st century. are all feeling the squeeze of the linger- ing recession that continues to plague the country in the early months of 2010. Burris Logistics, Inc., for the most part. Burris had a great 2009 and is off to an excellent start in 2010. Retailers, wholesalers and distributors The recession seems to have skipped has built its entire corporate culture around customer service. Burris isn’t striving in any way to be the cheapest company of its kind out there, although it certainly offers competitive pricing. What the company does offer, instead, is low cost partnerships with its customers that help them find the best way to han- dle their business. And, of course, world class expertise in the logistics of moving frozen, refrigerated and dry food around the country. Burris is, at its core, a company that expertise to our customers’ needs,” said Burris Logistics president, Donnie Bur- ris. “We work together with our cus- tomers to fulfill their needs in as efficient a manner as possible. We work to part- ner up with our customers and general- ly line-up with them to find the best way to help them handle their businesses.” Burris began in 1925 as a two-man operation. John W. Burris and his father, “Our goal is to apply our logistical In part, Burris’s success is attributa- Edward, worked together shipping refrigerated tomatoes from the Delmar- va Peninsula into Philadelphia. On the return trip, they carried Acme Markets’ bread to its Delmarva region stores. In 1986, Burris had one facility. At that time, the company began diversifying and spe- cializing—and growing. By 2009, Bur- ris had grown to 18 facilities located along the entire eastern seaboard. Over its 84-year history, Burris has branched into food-service redistribution, public refrigerated warehousing and custom and retail specialty work. little more than an idea and a commit- ment to hard work. From those meager roots, Burris has grown into a major cold and dry food logistics company with 18 warehouses serving the United States east of the Mississippi River. The company’s newest facility is a state-of-the art 266,000 square foot building in Rocky Hill, Conn., with plenty of room for growth. said. “But our desire is not to be the biggest. It’s to be the best.” “We’re growing nicely,” Mr. Burris down into several vertical categories, with the overall emphasis being on full At this stage, Burris’s operations break At the beginning, Burris Logistics was line frozen, refrigerated and dry food dis- tribution. Burris has been moving into aggressive- ly over the past several years, is food serv- ice redistribution. Recently, Burris com- pleted the acquisition of N. Winer and Son, a Springfield, Massachusetts based redistribution company that specializes in dairy products. er recent acquisition, Honor Foods, which specializes in the redistribution of frozen, refrigerated and dry foods across all major categories. Honor offers all of the classic benefits of redistribution— shorter lead times, lower minimums, improved inventory turns, out of stock reduction, inventory balancing—as well as sales and marketing information and support not normally found in redistrib- ution. With its most recent acquisition, Burris is able to marry Winer’s expertise in dairy redistribution with Honor’s spe- cialization in redistributing across all cat- egories. Burris’s intent with these acqui- sitions is to create a redistribution net- work that can focus on its core mission of efficiently serving the needs of its cus- tomer base in the most cost-effective (Continues on page Burr3) Burris has merged Winer with anoth- The first vertical category, and the one This is one of Burris Logistics new state of the art facilities located in Rocky Hill, Conn.. For more information on this facility, see page 8.
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