La Costeña

La Costeña was founded in 1923 by Vicente López Recines. He bought a little grocery shop called “La Costeña” where he began preparing chili peppers in vinegar. He packaged and sold chilies in 20-kilogram jars with alcohol so that they could last longer. By 1937 López decided to make his own jar company; this decision changed the business. In 1948, he founded the principal factory in Mexico City. It has an area of five thousand square meters. The new production plant counted on forklift trucks and transport units; as a consequence the business continued growing up and increasing their distribution territory. The business began its industrialization with the application of the first automatic production line with 3-kilogram cans in 1951. Four years later the company installed an automatic production line to making 105-gram cans, moreover the distribution inside the country began. By 1971 the factory moved to Ecatepec with a facility of 180,000 square meters. Since then this facility has increased by 70 thousand square meters.

In 1975 the company entered the U.S. market. The company continued growing and by 1991 it had founded a new production plant in Sonora for the production of ketchup, vegetables, and more. In 1994 a new plant was built in San Luis Potosí. In 2006 a new project about a completely automatic plant began; this new plant would work with robots; this creation represents a better and faster production with more quality.

In 2014, La Costeña acquired the American canning company Faribault Foods, founded in 1895. In 2015, La Costeña announced it would triple Faribault Foods manufacturing and warehouse space in Faribault, Minnesota to nearly 1 million square ft. over the next three years. The Faribault brands include S&W beans, SunVista beans and sauces, Luck's beans, KC Masterpiece baked beans, Mrs. Grimes chili beans, Kuner's of Colorado vegetables, Kern's nectar, Butter Kernel vegetables, ChilliMan chili, Pride vegetables and Totis snacks.

The company has a wide variety of products in different presentations. Their main products are chilies, beans, tomato puree, ketchup, mayonnaise, vegetables, creams and soups, sauces, specialties, vinegar, fruit, jams and marmalades, portion packs, Dona Chonita, Rancherita, and French’s.

Chili peppers

Products include jalapeños, nacho chilies (slices of jalapeños), jalapeño bits, serrano, serrano slices, rajas rojas, rajas verdes, tomatillos, chipotles, chipotle bits, carrot pieces and long chili peppers.

Beans

Another big part of the products are beans (black beans and kidney beans). Their presentations can be whole, refried and shattered beans. Some of them can be also mixed with chorizo, cheese, chipotle and pork rinds, finally the beans can be already prepared from traditional recipes as the frijoles charros or sauce for enfrijoladas (similar to enchiladas). However, PROFECO (special institute for the Mexican products quality) found that there was more sodium recommended in some canned beans.

Tomato puree

In tomato puree products one can find four different preparations: tomato puree, condiment tomato puree, condiment fire tomato and chopped peeled tomatoes. These tomato sauces are used to create the base for some Mexican soups and some Mexican dishes.