Weiling was founded in 1975 and has since grown to become one of Germany's largest organic wholesale traders. The company, still family owned 38 years later, supplies exclusively organic product lines to organic only stores.2012 saw Weiling achieve growth of 8.6%, turning over 145.2 million Euro with 11,000 strong organic product lines.
Fresh fruit and vegetables make an important contribution to this success, representing one third of total business.
Sascha Hinkes, head of Weilings department for purchasing fruits an vegetables explains that this high proportion of total sales activity is due to a strong focus on the quality of the fruit and vegetables traded. " supplies many subscription services for fruit and vegetables. Due to long term cooperation and commitment to the best possible quality, Weiling is very thorough in the selection of its fruit and vegetable suppliers."
This, Sascha explains, means regular mutual visits and additional auditing at producers by the Gessellschaft für Ressourcenshutz, one of the strictest organic inspectors in the EU.
"Weiling works with producers and production groups in Spain, Italy, Southern France and Tunisia, many of whom work to Naturland and Demeter standard; the rest will do so in the coming years. The end product is a unique brand developed exclusively with Weiling. Weiling then creates an extremely diverse marketing package, which includes posters, profiles, shelf labels, You-tube videos, training courses, tastings and QR codes to link smartphones with producer mini-sites."
Sascha says, however, that the Weiling package does not end there and the company also offers professional store development.
"Included in this is staff training at the Weiling Academy, which has already been visited by 10,000 people. Specialist personnel for organic shops are just as important as the high quality organic fruit and vegetables in store and Weiling has a central role in the development of sustainable trade specialists."
For more information:
Hanjörg Bahmann
Weiling
Tel: +49 2541 747 100
hanjoerg.bahmann@weiling.de