Today Food Processing Magazine, the food industry’s leading information source for food and beverage manufacturers, announced Hearthside Food Solutions has earned their coveted 2019 Food Processor of the Year Award. Each year the Food Processor of the Year Award recognizes innovation and operational excellence among leading food companies. 2019 is the first time this award has ever gone to a contract manufacturer.

This year’s honoree didn’t exist when we started naming Processors of the Year back in 2005. The company has no brands of its own and was assembled by private equity firms (and a former Big Food executive with a vision). But, almost overnight, Hearthside Food Solutions has amassed sales of $3 billion, operates 39 plants, including four in Europe, and is the industry’s largest contract manufacturer.

Hearthside Food Solutions is, first and foremost, a manufacturer, the actual producer of some of the most famous, successful and highest-quality baked goods in the U.S. The biggest marketers of cookies, crackers and bars entrust their brands to this Downers Grove, Ill., company. While Hearthside wouldn’t name customers.

Read the rest of the story on Food Processing.