DMH Ingredients has proven time and time again they can find the needed ingredient at a reasonable price

The Snappy Popcorn Co., K & W Popcorn Inc, and the Weaver Popcorn Co. all provide excellent raw popcorn expertly classed and sized. Their high quality popcorn is the best secret ingredient anyone could possibly hope for.

Aunt Em's would also like to acknowledge C. Cretors and Company for their excellent equipment and expertise in the art of preparing popcorn. C. Cretors and Company is the oldest popcorn equipment company in the world and a legend within the industry.

One of the least noticed and most important elements needed to market any product is packaging. From the flexible bag the product is placed in to the stretch wrap used to secure and protect the boxes on the pallets, and even the pallets themselves represent precisely designed materials to accomplish the specific task of protecting the product's freshness and integrity. Packaging is truly a science and Aunt Em's has been very fortunate to discover the following companies. They have the expertise to understand the science and the years of experience to help a customer find the right materials to meet their needs.

There are many different types of packaging films produced by the MILPRINT Co., which is a division of the Bemis Company. Among their many choices Aunt Em's Gourmet Popcorn selected a film structure, which is used widely within the snack industry. The film produces an easy open bag with a good oxygen barrier, and excellent moisture and UV barrier characteristics. Subsequent testing of the film structure has proven it to be ideal for protecting Aunt Em's popcorn products.

Protecting the product is just one of the jobs the packaging has to do. The packaging must also catch the eye of a customer and inform them of the type and quality of the product within the package. To accomplish these tasks a graphic artist is needed. Not just any artist will do though, because printing on flexible packaging material is also a science of its own. Fortunately Milprint has an in house graphic arts department. Since Milprint operates their own art department, they can keep prepress expenses and delays to a minimum.

Having a product made from the best possible ingredients prepared by the best equipment around with packaging material specifically formulated to protect the product and printed with the best design imaginable will get you exactly no where though. The product must be precisely measure and sealed inside the packaging material to be a saleable good. Of course this seemly simple little task must be accomplished in about one second. The bag isn't a bag yet, it's just a roll of plastic film. It must be formed into a bag shape and sealed airtight. Actually the bag must be airtight to keep the air out, because the air must be flushed out of the bag and replaced by nitrogen to further extend the freshness of the product. To accomplish this tricky little task Aunt Em's Gourmet Popcorn uses a Yamato combination scale to portion the product and a Hayssen packaging machine to convert the packaging material from roll stock to a sealed bag.

Getting the product in a sealed bag is certainly a major benchmark of any production line, but wholesales and retailers don't buy anything by the item. To combine the individual bags into a saleable group, a different type of packaging is needed. This package must protect the delicate product sealed inside the vulnerable plastic film bag. Of course the best package for the job is a box, but not just any old plain box will do. The box has to do more then protect the product, it must also serve as a point of sale display if needed. The second and third steps on the path to market a product are intertwined so much it is hard to say which comes first, but a product can't be sold unless it is displayed for customers to discover. A product can't be displayed without distribution paths and agreements for space in a retail outlet for the product to be displayed.. What distribution paths really mean is finding retail customers interested in carrying a product; and wholesale distributors with the means by which to get it to them. This step is arguably more difficult than the product creation and manufacturing step. Since producers from around the world develop literally thousands of new products each year, it can be very difficult to get interest from brokers, wholesalers, and retailers. Given this intense competition Aunt Em's is proud to have products represented by:

BROKERS

C.A. Fortune & Company located in Bloomingdale, Illinois

Enterprise Sales & Marketing Team in Arlington Texas

DISTRIBUTORS

Kehe Food Distributors, Inc. located in Romeoville Illinois
Kingshighway Produce in St. Charles Missouri
Elko Sales located in Buckner, Illinois
Newman & Ullman Inc located in Pekin Illinois

RETAILERS

Due to the nature of working through distributors to reach retail outlets, it is impossible to know all the retail outlets which carry our products. Aunt Em's Gourmet Popcorn is however aware of the following local ones listed below. If you are aware of retailers in your area carrying Aunt Em's products, please send the information to Aunt Em so it may be included in the list below:

THE BUTCHER BLOCK located in Peorai Illinois
DAVE'S SUPERMARKET located in Fairbury Illinois
IGA FOODS located in Eureka, Metamora, and El Paso Illinois
JUBILEE FOODS located in Germantown Hills Illinois
LINDY'S DOWNTOWN MARKET located in Washington Illinois
PARKWAY AUTO LAUNDRY located in Bloomington and Normal Illinois
SCHNUCKS MARKETS INC located in the greater Central Illinois area
SUPER PANTRY select stores operated by Tri Star Marketing INC
CUB FOODS stores located in the central Illinois and Wisconsin
FRESH BRAND DISTRIBUTING INC operating Piggly Wiggly and Dick's Supermarkets in Illinois and Wisconsin
THE ANDERSONS retails stores located in Ohio
NEIMAN FAMILY grocery stores located throught out Illinois
SULLIVANS FOODS operating stores in northern Illinois
GIANT EAGLE retails stores serving the Ohio, West Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania area

ON-LINE RETAILERS

Occasionally Aunt Em's products are offered as part of a group of products packaged for special occasions or purposes. The following on line retailers have chosen to include Aunt Em's products as an item, which compliments their own products:

REDNECK SNACK BASKETS located in Homer Illinois feature a variety of unique snack baskets special occasion gifts