Michigan Co-Packers to Make and Package Your Food Product: Jams, Salsa, Sauces, Pickles, Cookies, Pies, cakes, whatever!

Looking for Michigan Co-Packers to Make and Package Your Food Product: Jams, Salsa, Sauces, Pickles, Cookies, Pies, cakes, whatever! in 2021?  Scroll down this page and  follow the links. And if you bring home some fruit or vegetables and want to can, freeze, make jam, salsa or pickles, see this page for simple, reliable, illustrated canning, freezing or preserving directions. There are plenty of other related resources, click on the resources dropdown above.

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Michigan Co-Packers to Make and Package Your Food Product: Jams, Salsa, Sauces, Pickles, Cookies, Pies, cakes, whatever!

Michigan Co-Packers: Want to Sell Your Salsa, Preserves, Jams, Etc.? Learn About Using A CoPacker to Prepare It!

If you want to make and sell your home-made preserves, salsa, spaghetti sauce, applesauce, apple butter, jams, jellies, or whatever, you will need a licensed kitchen to prepare and can the food. That's fine for relatively small quantities, and if there is a licensed kitchen to rent nearby at a good cost. See this page for shared use kitchens in Michigan. But it may be less expensive (and less risky) for your new business to use a CoPacker to prepare their food, according to you recipe and process. 

What is a Co-Packer?

Co-packers manufacture and package foods for other companies to sell.  These products range from nationally-known brands to private labels.  Entrepreneurs choose to use the services of copackers for many reasons.  Copackers can provide entrepreneurs with a variety of services in addition to manufacturing and packaging products.  They can often help in the formulation of the product.  The copacker may function only as a packer of other people's products or may be in business with his own product line.  They may be, in fact, manufacturing several competing products.  The range of services available from a copacker will vary depending on the size and experience of the copacker and the type of facilities and the capacity of their plant.

Choosing a Co-Packer

You will want to choose a co-packer who has experience making the type of product and packaging that you need.  You may also want to choose a co-packer that is located close to you or your source materials and/or market or distribution centers to reduce costs.

See this page for much, much more about co-packers, like advantages, disadvantages and how to choose a copacker.

The following list consists of companies in Michigan that have co-packing capabilities. This list is neither all-inclusive, nor is it meant to serve as an endorsement.

If you are a co-packer wishing to be added to this list, add your information here.

Michigan Co-Packers

• American Spoon Foods - preserves, salsa, sauces, condiments.
  1668 Clarion Avenue, Petoskey, MI 49770. Phone: 616-347-9030: Fax: 800-647-2512.
• Festida Foods  -
  219 Canton SW Suite A, Grand Rapids, MI 49507. Phone: 616-241-0400. Festida Foods is a privately-owned family business employing approximately 200 individuals, making some of the best quality, best tasting, and most innovative tortilla chips and other salty snacks in the industry. Our promise and commitment to our customers, vendors, and employees is: To honor God in all we do, to help our people develop, to pursue excellence, and to grow profitably.
  Festida Foods' business consists wholly of private label and co-packing services. Unlike other co-packers, we are not a brand owner or promoter, and therefore we do not compete with our customers. We are proud to develop and manufacture snack foods for many major national retailers, nationally distributed brands, regional grocers, and food service providers. For these customers we ship product throughout all of the US, Canada, and Mexico.
  
• Food For Thought, Inc. - fruit preserves, sauces, BBQ and salsa, dressings and juice concentrates
  10704 Oviatt Road, Honor, MI 49640. Phone: (231) 326-5444. Email: [email protected]. Contact: Timothy Young
  Description of services or product specialties: Hot and cold pack glass and plastic bottling focusing on fruit preserves, sauces, BBQ and salsa, dressings and juice concentrates. Certified Organic.
• Lesley Elizabeth, Inc. - Condiments and Oils, Balsamic Vinegar, Other Grains, Cereal and Pasta, Beans, Seasonings and Cooking Enhancers
  877 Whitney Drive, Lapeer, MI 48446. Phone: 800-684-3300; 810-667-0706. Fax: 810-667-7287. Email: [email protected]. Contact: Gary Bates, National Sales Manager.  Co-packing and custom production packaging is limited to dry seasoning blends, spices and rubs in glass and plastic (PET) jars. They also package oils, vinegars and a combination of oil and vinegar with the addition of a dry seasoning blend.
• Street Eatzz -
  Detroit, MI. We have the capacity to Micro Co Pack in our commercial kitchen in Hamtramck where Chef Tom and Chef Al make our Street Eatzz Foodie Sauces and Marie's Salsa and BBQ Sauce. We produce small batch runs of under (30) Cases, matching production to your cash flow and sales volume. Co packing is only part of solving the budding Food Entrepreneurs pain point and problem. We are proposing a complete solution to help a new start up Food Entrepreneur Bridge the Gap between Start Up to transition from a Hobby to a Business. It makes no sense for us each to one off be calling on retail stores, producing product in one off production runs and an unorganized distribution matrix.
• The Starting Block -
  1535 Industrial Park Drive, Hart, MI 49432. Phone: 231-873-1432. Fax: 231-873-1458. Email: [email protected] Contact: Jane Dosemagen
• Traverse Bay Farms - Fruit, gourmet and garden salads.
  7053 M-88 South, Bellaire, MI 49615. Phone: 231-533-8788. Fax: 231-676-0453. Contact: Andy LaPointe.. CoPackers of shelf stable fruit, salsas, jams, jellies apple and other butters, sauces and syrups etc.

Other Resources

If you still can't find a suitable co-packer for your product, see this organization:

• Contract Packaging Association
  1833 Centre Point Circle, Suite 123
  Naperville, IL 60563. Email: [email protected];

Where can I find more information about canning?

For more than 250 specific, simple recipes with step-by-step directions and photos; and general information on canning and food preservation, see this page.