RICHMOND – Campbell’s held an event on Thursday to show off their new $160 million goldfish cracker maker.
The new cracker line will produce more than 5 million Goldfish an hour or 1,500 Goldfish every second. The company is part of the Campbell Snack Division of the Campbell’s Company.
AJ Heiner, sr. director of site operations, said the plant just celebrated the cracker and cookie maker being in Richmond for 50 years.
“We have 450 employees in Cache Valley at our Richmond plant and our distribution centers,” he said. “These 160 million investments to our Richmond facility is the largest investment in rural Utah.”
He praised the employees for their efforts in producing goldfish and other cookies at the facility.
Heiner said Goldfish is the number one snack for teens in America.
Chris Foley, president of Campbell’s Snacks, said the Richmond investment was the brand’s biggest investments the company has made.
“Our Goldfish production began in the 1960’s when (Pepperidge Farms) founder and owner Margaret Rudkin discovered the fish shaped cracker while visiting Switzerland,” he said. “Margaret found them at a bakery and bought the rights for U.S. manufacturing.”
Foley said the Swiss baker made the goldfish crackers for his wife who’s Zodiac sign was Picas. The baker made the fish cracker for her. It’s kind of a love story.
“Officially, Goldfish is the number one brand in the Campbell Company,” Foley said. “With the new onsite flour mill it will increase the efficiency and quality of our Goldfish line.”
The new mill is expected to be in operation by the end of the year.
Richmond Mayor Paul Erickson said he appreciated the business relationship the city and county have with Campbell’s, formerly known as Pepperidge Farms.
“We look forward to a long partnership with Pepperidge Farms,” he said.” We hope more of the employees would move to our city.”
Cass Green, SVP supply chain, talked about what a beautiful place the Richmond plant was in.
”The future looks bright for us in this facility,” she said.“This new oven changes so many things for us.”
Campbell’s uses the latest technology and state-of-the-art production equipment. The Richmond plant is their only manufacturing facility in the west of the Rocky Mountains. The northern Utah plant currently produces millions of pounds of cookies, crackers and frozen products each year.
Also this week, the 155-year-old Campbell Soup Company decided to drop “soup” from its corporate name, rebranding it as The Campbell’s Company.
More consumers are reaching for their snacks and ditching their soups. The company not only owns snack brands like Goldfish and Pepperidge Farms, they also own Snyder’s of Hanover, Cape Cod, and others. They also added Sovos Brands, maker of Italian food brands like Rao’s sauces.