Foodservice

From Pasture to Plate: Sysco Highlights the Value of Beef Quality Assurance

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 13:36:08 GMT

The best beef is raised the right way. This message was reinforced by remarks from Joe Don Eilers, Sysco vice president of merchandising, during the Beef Quality Assurance (BQA) Producer Forum, which was part of CattleCon 2026.

Representing one of the nation’s largest food service distributors, Eilers shares how best practices in cattle care and beef production influence beef product, ultimately reaching the plates of restaurants and kitchen tables of consumers.

“At the end of the day, quality beef is a safe, wholesome product for our participants to use,” Eilers says, adding the ultimate goal is delivering a mouth-watering steak that keeps customers coming back for more.

Industry collaboration is key to delivering this eating experience, and programs like BQA help ensure consistency from pasture to plate. For decades, BQA has provided science-based guidelines and education to help family farmers and ranchers improve cattle care, product quality and consumer confidence.

“We believe in the value that the BQA program has brought to the industry for decades,” Eilers says. “That mission to bring knowledge about best practices and innovations to producers across the industry has resulted in a better product that we’re able to purchase and ultimately serve to consumers.”

The commitment to cattle care and continuous improvement is also reflected in the Raised with Respect program, a partnership between Certified Angus Beef and Sysco, now in its third year. The initiative helps expand awareness of BQA principles while supporting educational resources for ranchers and additional collaboration across universities, extension systems and industry partners.

“This campaign is really about bringing another level of awareness to the work BQA has done over the years,” Eilers says, “and creating more opportunities to communicate what can be improved in beef production.”

The commitment to advancing best practices and helping to ensure beef demand recently earned Sysco national recognition — National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) named the company the 2026 BQA Marketer of the Year during CattleCon. This award highlights leaders who go above and beyond to promote BQA and support responsible cattle care across the beef industry.

“As a primary producer-facing program, BQA has been providing guidelines and resources to help cattlemen improve their cattle and resulting beef for decades,” says Josh White, NCBA senior executive director of producer education and sustainability. “It’s exciting to see this work done on farms and ranches across the country and also lends value for how a large beef seller, like Sysco, tells the beef production story.”

For Eilers, those efforts also help build trust with consumers who want greater transparency about how their food is raised.

“Customers and consumers today want more and more information about the products they’re buying and eating,” he says. “The BQA program really helps us talk about best practices around animal husbandry and environmental stewardship, and that builds confidence in the beef producers raise.”

Costco in Mexico Expands Sales of U.S. Beef and Pork To Foodservice Clientele

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 21:49:23 GMT

Costco in Mexico is expanding sales of U.S. beef and pork to foodservice clientele so recently the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) has been training sales staff on the needs of restaurant and resort chefs, says John Herath for USMEF. Support from USDA, the Beef Checkoff Program and the National Pork Board have helped with those efforts. USMEF Mexico corporate chef German Navarrete shares more details.

“Costco is a very important partner for USMEF because they only carry U.S. beef and pork,” Navarrete says. “When people go to their stores, they knew they will find this very high quality and consistent product that they are looking for, and that’s exactly what U.S. beef and pork provide.”

Navarette says they have points of sale all over the country so seminars focus not only on people who walk into the stores, but also on how to approach restaurants and hotels who also offer a array of U.S. beef and pork products.

“We carried out some seminars in order to train their sales force so that they know, not only the products, but how can it apply to restaurants and hotels and all of the different dishes that they can produce with all these different cuts that they have in their portfolio,” he says.

Seminars focus on equipment, target market and cooking methods.

“By training sales personnel as to the best cooking methods for each piece, they can approach the customers in this regard,” Navarette says. “We talk about cooking, not only cooking methods, but also the kind of equipment that they use at restaurants and hotels. So they know and they are aware of it, and they can recommend the best product for the best results.”

U.S. pork exports to Mexico are reaching new heights in 2024, USMEF reports. Through October, exports totaled nearly 950,000 metric tons, up 6% from last year’s record pace, valued at $2.1 billion (up 11%). Beef exports increased 13% to 193,000 metric tons, while value climbed 15% to $1.12 billion.

Freight Rates Skyrocket

Tue, 15 Nov 2022 07:27:49 GMT

Transportation woes continue to haunt Northeast shippers as trucks remain hard to come by and freight rates skyrocket because of rising fuel costs and a scarcity of drivers.

“Trucks are at a premium right now,” said Tracie Levin, controller at M. Levin and Co. , in Philadelphia.

“It’s a major hindrance for our industry and anyone else that uses trucking, which is basically every industry out there,” she said.

Shippers can’t even buy trucks.

“We’ve been on wait lists to get more trucks, trailer and tractors,” she said. “You just cannot get those things these days.”

But Levin is optimistic that things will turn around. She said some relief is already in evidence.

“We’re slowly able to get things again in a semi timely manner,” she said.

East Coast shippers have been dealing with transportation issues, but there are trucks available, said Tom Beaver, director of sales and marketing for Sunny Valley International Inc. , in Glassboro, N.J.

“Obviously, the cost of brokering a truck, especially for our (less-than-load) business, has increased considerably, but the same is true for all of our competitors,” he said. “We’re adjusting to this ‘new normal,’ but the important thing is that we can get fruit loaded and out to our customers on time and in full.”

Transportation challenges are more prevalent during the winter than they are during the spring and summer for Vineland, N.J.-based The Freshwave Fruit & Produce and its growing operation, Consalo Family Farms , said Chelsea Consalo, executive vice president.

That’s because the company has more local deals during the warmer months.

During the winter, the firm must bring in products from outside growing areas, such as Mexico, and transport fruits and vegetables imported from offshore growing regions, such as Chile, from U.S. ports.

“We have more trucks on the road (in winter),” she said.

Transportation costs are a major concern.

“We’re managing to get the trucks,” Consalo said. “It is just more expensive.”

(Farm Journal)

The Freshwave has added Nick Crisafulli, who recently completed an internship at Americold Logistics LLC, to its logistics staff to help arrange transportation.

Vineland-based Flaim Farms Inc . has its own fleet of trucks for local deliveries, said president Ryan Flaim.

But trying to find trucks for destinations that are farther out is challenging.

The company has good relationships with trucking firms, but rates are much higher than they have been in the past, Flaim said.

Finding transportation isn’t a problem, as long as you’re willing to pay exorbitant fees, said Joel Fierman, president of New York-based Joseph Fierman and Sons Inc .

“It’s really a pity when your cost for transportation pretty much is as high as your cost for goods,” he said.

He blamed the price spike on high fuel costs and a scarcity of drivers.

“It’s a terrible, terrible thing that this country is experiencing right now,” he said.

An added problem during the Christmas season was that many trucks were sidetracked delivering Christmas trees.

“It’s fast, easy money,” he said.

Filindo Colace, vice president of operations for Philadelphia-based Ryeco LLC , attributes the skyrocketing inflation rate the industry has experienced to high freight costs.

“Freight has been a premium for quite some time,” he said.

While seed prices and other costs have also gone up, he said high freight rates are 90% of the cause of inflation.

“Nothing in the industry has gone up at the same rate as freight has,” Colace said.

But he remains optimistic.

“We think the country is moving on,” he said. “We’re going to be as back-to-business as usual as possible in the first quarter of next year.”

He expected buying patterns to return to where they were in 2019.

“We hope the workforce returns to those levels, as well,” he said.

“If that’s the case, it will be our expectation that freight rates will start to lower because there are more truck drivers coming back into the workforce.”

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